


Ground Zero

by eggstasy



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Between Seasons/Series, Gen, Post-Season 12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-20 21:39:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 44,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6026035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eggstasy/pseuds/eggstasy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When reports come back of lingering merc activity in a set of old ruins in the jungle, Tucker and Caboose set out to investigate only to discover that the previous inhabitants of Chorus had bitten off much more than they could chew.  Their bond as teammates will be put to the test as they try to outrun both Charon's mercenaries and the voracious, insatiable hunger of the Flood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pompom Jellyfish

“This planet is the shittiest planet in the galaxy,” Tucker complains, swatting a palm-frond-thing out of his face. Not a palm frond- whatever the fuck those things are, palm-ish type plants. Palmetto. Something. “Seriously. I never thought I’d find someplace I hate more than that stupid fucking canyon, but I stand corrected.”

“We’re not really standing,” Caboose points out. The way he stomps so easily through everything when Tucker keeps taking branches to the face is infuriating. “We’re kind of walking slash climbing? If we were just standing still you wouldn’t keep getting hit so much.”

“Yes. Thank you Caboose, for pointing out the fucking obvious.”

Caboose mutters, “Not very nice.”

 _Investigate the ruins,_ Kimball had said when she’d handed out his orders. _It’s not a big deal. There’s been no pirate activity around there for months, we just want to see if we can tell what they were after. I don’t think you’ll run into any trouble, but Chorus’s forces are already spread too thin so you’ll have to do this one solo._

And then fucking Church, that prick, had to jump in. _Actually, I’ve got an idea._

That’s how Tucker ended up in the middle of a jungle with _Caboose_ at his back which, by the way, is not the safest position to be in. Even if Freckles has trigger control now Caboose is still plenty dangerous. Not to mention plenty fucking loud; the undergrowth doesn’t stand a chance as he tears right through it like a blunt blue machete. If there _had_ been mercs around, they’d have heard their approach from miles away.

Tucker stops. “Hey Caboose. Do you wanna be on point?”

Caboose, immediately suspicious, backs up a few paces. Considering some of the shit Tucker’s tricked the guy into doing the reaction is admittedly a fair one. “Why?”

“Because then when we get wherever we’re going, you’ll be the first to see it! Doesn’t that sound exciting? You’ll get to tell Church and Wash that you got there _first._ ”

“I _do_ like coming in first,” Caboose muses.

 _Bow chika-_ **no.** “You and Freckles can be in front and it’s like you’re _leading_ the mission. All you have to do is go where I tell you. Sound good, buddy?”

Even with his helmet on, the look Caboose gives Tucker is obviously dubious but then he’s crashing past, branches snapping with the force of his exuberance. “Oh man, the view is so much better up here!” Tucker has seventy-five percent fewer plants trying to bitchslap him and Caboose is happier, everybody wins. He’s so good at this babysitting shit.

With Caboose almost literally mowing down the path in front of them, their pace picks up quite a bit. A clearing opens up in front of them as a sudden lack of vegetation; Tucker almost smacks into Caboose’s back when he stops without warning. He peers around Caboose’s shoulder to find his toes inches from a crumbling cliff and he grabs the back of his teammate’s armor to drag him away from the edge. “ _Christ!_ Shit, that was close.”

“Cliff ahead,” Caboose sings.

Tucker pats him on the back, staring down at what would probably have been their very painful but comically bouncy deaths. “Good eye.” The jungle continues down past the cliff, filling the basin like a mold but Tucker thinks he can see the glint of metal beneath the trees below that matches up with the coordinates on his HUD. “And those’re our ruins. See a way down?”

Caboose kicks a stick over the edge of the precipice and watches it tumble down, leaning a little too far over the edge of the cliff for Tucker’s comfort. “We could always fall? That’s fast.”

“Yeah, no.” Huge tree roots crawl over the edge of the cliff, embedded in the rock nearly all the way to the base. They could climb down, though it would leave their backs vulnerable to a surprise attack. “Freckles, do a scan for hostiles.”

The assault rifle remains silent.

“Oh my god,” Tucker complains. “Caboose? Would you tell your dog to scan already?”

“Yes um, Freckles? Please look and see if you can find any bad guys down there please?”

Freckles whirrs mechanically, attitude in its robotic tone when it answers, “ _ **NO HOSTILE FORCES DETECTED, CAPTAIN CABOOSE.**_ ”

“He doesn’t like it when you’re bossy,” Caboose whispers loudly.

“He’s also an asshole who’s tried to kill me like eight times, so I don’t care about his feelings.” Tucker crouches and yanks on one particular tangle of roots as hard as he can. “We’re gonna climb down. Don’t fall and die, I don’t want the headache Wash will give me if I don’t come back with you.”

Caboose falls off about halfway down anyway, and then whines about how long Tucker takes to climb down normally. “I told you falling would work,” he shouts up at Tucker.

The ruins aren’t far into the jungle beyond the cliff, only barely in a clearing in that there’s just enough space to run around the perimeter of the temple. The door, while old and overgrown, looks to be mostly intact save for some scorch marks along the seam. “Looks like someone failed their B&E class,” Tucker muses as he brandishes his sword. The doors light up blue along the edges and slide open with a grinding hiss, dislodging vines and leaves.

“There’s a bacon and eggs class?! Oh man, I _totally_ should’ve gone to college,” Caboose bemoans as they enter.

“Ugh.” Tucker grimaces, reaching up to cover his nose reflexively and banging his hand into his visor. “This place is fucking _nasty._ It’s rank in here.”

“What rank? Is it higher than a captain?”

“Do you not smell that? Jesus _Christ_ it’s like something died!” Tucker almost gags and considers switching over to his internal oxygen supply, but…no, better not. That thing only has a few hours. Still, the stink has to be really bad if his suit’s filters can’t completely scrub it out. He doesn’t even want to think about walking around here without his armor. “It’s like something shit on the floor and then died in it.”

Sunlight struggles to filter in from a few holes in the ceiling. While its descent is largely blocked by the jungle canopy, with how weak the glow from the light fixtures is any additional light is welcome and gives Tucker a chance to take stock of their surroundings. Strange, unidentifiable yellowish stains dot the ground, smears of brown and green streak the walls, slime dripping from cracks in the walls.

“I hate this detail.” Tucker switches on his capture software to start recording. “Star date what-the-fuck-ever. Kimball? You owe me so much. Do you see how disgusting this place is? I’m gonna need about fifty showers to get rid of this smell.”

“Oh my god! It stinks really bad Tucker, do you smell that?!” Caboose gasps. “ _Did you_ _ **do**_ _that?_ ”

“ _Shut up_ Caboose- You owe me too, Church, for _him_. All of you owe me. I hate you.” Tucker turns and spots Caboose poking at some weird gross fungus thing with the muzzle of his rifle. “Caboose! Just- Stop doing that, go keep watch at the doorway. Radio me if somebody tries to come inside.”

“ _Fine…_ ” Caboose shuffles off toward the door.

Tucker heads over to what looks like some kind of platform elevator; there’s a space where it looks like there’s supposed to be a control panel, so he snaps his sword out and the display flares to life. “He’s totally gonna forget what I just said,” Tucker mutters to himself, punching what is hopefully a ‘go down’ button. “He’s gonna wander off and get lost or make friends with some fucking deadly wild animal that eats people or some shit.” The platform starts to descend with a jerk. “I really hate you guys,” Tucker says again, for lack of any ambient noise other than the quiet hum of the elevator beneath his boots.

Wandering the platform turns out to be a hazard when he almost drops right through a gaping hole directly in the center. “Holy shit,” he exclaims, stumbling back and falling on his ass. “Who puts a _hole_ in the middle of an _elevator platform?!_ That’s a major fucking design flaw!” He crawls closer to investigate and touches the rough edges of the hole, cut through both the metal and glass. “…huh. Guess someone _didn't_ fail B &E class after all.”

The elevator slows with a shudder and sinks down softly into an indentation in the floor; Tucker clips his sword to his hip and unslings his battle rifle from his back instead. The hole on the elevator wasn’t a design flaw. Someone had tried to- well, actually someone had probably _succeeded_ in making it to the lower levels. Tucker considers briefly going back to retrieve Caboose, but he’d probably be safer _without_ the idiot at this point.

If the entrance to the temple had been gross, the floors below are fucking putrid. The stains have a more papier-mâché look to it, mottled browns and yellows and greens that looked like projectile vomit. There’s a faint cloudy mist in the air, like spores or pollen and the stench is strong enough to make Tucker gag for real this time and he pauses, swallowing to make sure he really isn’t about to blow chunks inside of his own helmet before he heads deeper into the much smaller tunnels. “The fuck is this,” he murmurs, thumbing the safety on his rifle nervously. “Any Sangheili going through here would’ve had to fuckin’ _crouch._ Why’re the doors so small?”

A series of twisting hallways finally opened up into a large cavernlike room with a lightbridge crossing the gap. Tucker makes it halfway over the bridge before he curses and runs back as quietly as he can, putting his back to a pillar. Bedrolls and radio equipment. There a _re_ pirates here. “ _Shit,_ ” Tucker breathes before nudging himself out of his cover, peering through the scope of his rifle at the small encampment. No movement. “Okay, so, looks like there are definitely some guys here. All their shit’s still out.”

Tucker debates dropping down from the bridge to investigate: even if they had to leave in a hurry, they wouldn’t have left their radio behind. They had to still be around, but if he can _get_ that radio then it might have their communication frequencies still programmed into it. Church could use it to spy on their channels or something, maybe.

Tucker waits another minute, fingers tense on his rifle. “Fuck it,” he whispers before looking around for a quick dropdown area. He finds some old Sangheili supply crates and climbs down, sliding off the edge and creeping over to the encampment. The radio’s fuzzing static gets louder as he approaches and Tucker’s brow furrows. Why would they leave their radio on?

When nobody jumps him and no booby traps spring up into his face Tucker stands, lowering his rifle as he investigates. MRE containers litter the ground but they don’t seem recently used. The bedrolls have a fine coating of that disgusting mist on them. It’s not _that_ thick, but Tucker doesn’t pretend to be some mastermind at examining a crime scene. Or…tracking pirates or whatever. He has to assume they’ll be back.

“Good enough.” Tucker grabs the radio and fiddles with it until it shuts up, tucking it under his arm and snapping his rifle to his back to make movement easier. “Right, so those guys were here and are probably _still_ here, so I guess it’s good I came down here? Good for _you_. I’m never fuckin’ coming back. I don’t know what kind of parties they’re having to fuck this place up so bad, but I am _not_ attending.”

He scales back up the containers, hurries through the hallways and jumps onto the elevator in record time, eager to get back topside and to the relative sunshine of jungle cover. Something about this place gives him the fucking _creeps._

The elevator is just barely starting up the shaft when he hears the distinct _rat-a-tat-tat_ of assault rifle fire echoing from above and Tucker almost drops the radio in his hurry to get his own internal comm channel on. “Caboose! What happened, why’re you shooting?!”

Static.

“Fuck-! Shit, goddamn elevator, can’t you go any faster?!” Tucker kicks at the display stand and anxiously stares up at the widening hole as he approaches the top of the shaft. Two thirds of the way up the signal starts clearing enough for Tucker to pick out words.

_-uck-…saw som-…blew up-!_

“Caboose, say again, the signal's all fucked up-”

_Freckles saw-…-nd when he shot it, it blew up!_

“ _What_ blew up?!” Tucker jumps up onto the floor before the platform slides into place, dropping the radio and unslinging his battle rifle to bolt for the doorway. “Caboose, do you copy?!”

He pauses at the edge of the jungle cover, rifle raised as he scans his surroundings. “ _Caboose_ ,” he whispers before swearing and repeating himself more loudly. “ _Caboose!_ If you don’t fucking answer me-”

The undergrowth rustles violently and Caboose stumbles out, Freckles clutched tight in his hands. “Hello!”

“ _Shit,_ ” Tucker exclaims, lowering his rifle. “You moron, I almost shot you! Where were you, what happened? Why’d you leave without calling me first, I _told you_ -”

“I _tried_ Tucker, but you didn’t pick up!” Caboose huffs at him, staring back into the jungle and doing that leaning closer thing he does when he’s nervous. “Freckles said there was a thing, and I asked how many things and he said just one, so I went to get it so it wouldn’t come inside.”

Tucker ignores the relief that pools in him when he doesn’t find any burns or bullet holes or blood anywhere on Caboose. “You’re an idiot. What if that ‘one thing’ was a merc? You would’ve gotten your stupid head shot off.”

“Would not. Freckles is the best.”

“ _ **THANK YOU, CABOOSE.**_ ”

“You’re welcome, Freckles,” Caboose says pleasantly.

Tucker groans aloud and turns to head back into the ruins and collect the radio. “Okay so who’d you shoot? _Was_ it a merc?”

Caboose cocks his head to the side. Tucker can practically _hear_ his face scrunching up beneath his visor. “Nnnno. It was…a thing.”

Tucker thinks of how many ways he's going to get back at Church for foisting this moron off onto him for this mission. “What _kind_ of thing?”

“A thing with legs…and a huge brain…” Caboose dawdles by the entrance to the ruins, peering worriedly inside. “He was waving at me and I named him Sir Woggles, and then Freckles shot at him and he laid down to go to sleep and blew up. And then a whole bunch of little Woggles Juniors came out and ran away. Those ones looked like pompom jellyfish.”

“I don’t even fucking know what you’re saying to me anymore,” Tucker grunts, getting the radio under one arm.

“It’s true! It was right over there, he made a big mess when he-”

“Caboose? I literally do not care about whatever wild animal you and Freckles stalked and murdered. I just want to get in the fucking Pelican and go home. We’re leaving.”

Caboose falls into step behind Tucker, murmuring to himself and glancing over his shoulder. Twice he runs into Tucker’s back until Tucker gets frustrated and swats at him, shoving him to march in front.

Getting back up the cliff might’ve been an ordeal with the radio but Tucker –being a genius- just straps the thing to his back with some vines and climbs carefully up the way they’d come down. Caboose doesn’t fall once and climbs a hell of a lot faster than Tucker does, glancing back over his shoulder toward the ruins and the surrounding jungle.

Tucker ultimately decides to keep the radio on his back and just carts his rifle instead, feeling as twitchy as Caboose looks. “Caboose. Knock it off. You’re seriously stressing me out. Did you take your pills before we left?”

“ _Yes,_ ” Caboose insists, walking backwards to watch the cliff until he runs into a tree, startles and showers it with confetti. “I didn’t like the pompom jellyfish. They were gross.”

“ _You’re_ gross.”

“ _You’re gross!_ ”

“Would you stop whining about it? Look, there’s the Pelican. Just get inside alrea-” Tucker blinks when Caboose bolts ahead and immediately smacks the ramp drop button, clambering inside. “…dy. Okay.” That twitchy feeling isn’t going away. Tucker had chalked it up to sneaking into a merc encampment (a generous word for a bunch of bedrolls and trash, sure, but that’s how he’s going to sell it to Church when they get back to Armonia), but now he can’t help but wonder if it’s just a vibe sort of thing given how spooked Caboose is. The idiot might be incapable of reasoning and rational thought…or any kind of thought…but it was the same as watching birds fleeing a thunderstorm. Or dogs freaking out just before an earthquake. Really stupid birds and dogs.

“Whatever,” Tucker breathes as he drops the radio into a seat and yanks the harness down over it. He heads into the cockpit and looks at the notes Grif had taped onto the console. Tucker had gotten an aptly-named crash course on how to fly the thing since Kimball couldn’t even spare so much as a pilot for the mission. Still, Tucker had managed to fly it and land it here, so he’s relatively sure he can make it back. Doyle probably won’t care about the scuff marks on the sides. Or the leaves stuck in the wing flaps. Or the dented landing gear. “Caboose, raise the ramp up.”

“Tucker? Sir Woggles the second is outside.”

Tucker leans over the cockpit dividing wall to look at Caboose fidgeting nervously at the bay door, staring past the clearing into the jungle thick. “Caboose. I don’t fucking care. Raise the ramp, get in a seat and strap in.”

“He’s waving.”

“I _don_ -” Tucker trails off when he gets a look at ‘Sir Woggles’ past Caboose’s shoulder, heart beginning to pound in his chest. “What…the _fuck_ is that…”

At first it doesn’t look threatening at all; the way it moves is like a hyperactive toddler with a full diaper, all wobbling unsteady footsteps at a shuffling power walk, but it doesn’t have a fucking _face_ and it’s just- legs with a brain, like Caboose said, a pulsating sack brain and wildly thrashing tentacles and that is _not_ a fucking animal.

“Fuck no I am not waiting around for this horror movie bullshit,” Tucker says as he flicks the ignition on and jumps from his seat to grab Caboose and force him into a seat, shoving the harness down against his barrel chest until it clicks.

“ _ **HOSTILE FORCES DETECTED**_ ,” Freckles drones.

“Yeah, thanks Freckles! Thanks for the fucking heads up!” Tucker slams his fist into the ramp lift button and scrambles back into the pilot seat, skimming Grif’s scrawled notes and flicking a few switches. There’s a sound like a popped balloon from outside and the Pelican jerks once as it lifts, as if struggling against heavy winds. “Shit! What the hell was that?!”

“Probably Sir Woggles the second going to sleep,” Caboose suggests. Tucker hears his harness unlatch and his boots clomp on the deck as he goes to peer out the peephole in the bay door. “Ohhh man, he has a lot of cousins.”

“Caboose, get back in your seat,” Tucker snarls. The motion tracker in the console lights up with over a dozen little red dots and when Tucker takes a deep breath he almost pukes, inhaling that stench from inside the temple just as something slithers over Pelican windshield, leaving a sick yellow trail. “ _Fuck!_ ”

“Pompom jellyfish!” Caboose shouts in alarm from just behind Tucker which Freckles echoes with, “ _ **ENGAGING TARGETS**_.”

“Freckles don’t you fucking dare shoot anything while we’re in here!” Tucker orders. “Relax! We’ll shake them off once we get moving!” That’s the plan. That’s a good plan, they’re fine, the armor plating on the Pelicans is-

_POP._

The Pelican lurches violently to the side and Caboose slams against the wall. Tucker grips the console to avoid being thrown from the pilot seat but there’s an alarm blaring red and loud, an indicator flashing angrily over one of the intake fans.

“Trees!” Caboose yelps just before Tucker hears a crackle- _snap_ and they lurch again, this time to the other side, down and forward and the engines are still going, propelling them tail end over nose and Tucker’s gonna be sick, he’s gonna drown in his own puke- Caboose slams back into the holding bay with a _clang_ , they’re in freefall – _the cliff,_ Tucker manages to think before his head bangs against a bulkhead hard enough that he sees stars and then red and then nothing, nothing at all.

 

* * *

 

“Epsilon, what’s my time?”

Nothing.

Carolina puffs a breath at the bangs sticking to her forehead. “Church.” When he doesn’t answer she reaches back and taps the chip at the base of her skull in irritation. “Church! Hey!”

_YEAH sorry, sorry. Working through some stuff. Uhhh you are at twenty-seven minutes and thirty seconds. Two-thirty left to go._

Carolina glances over the track. There are recruits milling around the edge, apprehensive. Still afraid of her. Well, it wasn’t surprising; she shows up out of nowhere with the supposedly-deceased Reds and Blues in tow, the guy they’re _already_ afraid of deferring to her left and right and on top of that she looks like she’s talking to herself whenever she’s out of armor. They probably think she’s some kind of half-crazed top secret super soldier. Not that they’re entirely _wrong_ , it’s just that she prefers to earn her reputation instead of having it stampede in before her actual arrival. “Working through what stuff?”

_Huh what?_

“If your ‘stuff’ is going to be this much of a distraction I can always find a local server to dump you in so you’ll have more processing room.”

_No, nah, it’s not that. Well it’s sort of that. Mostly that._

“Are you going to answer my question?”

_They’re files from the UNSC that I lifted before you guys came to get me._

“UNSC files? Are you _supposed_ to have these files?”

_Define ‘supposed to.’_

“Church,” Carolina growls.

 _If we’re going strictly with a legal definition, not really._ _**But!** _ _I have a good reason for grabbing this stuff. That reason is because I was bored and I was gonna be stuck in Tucker’s storage unit for the unforeseeable future and there’s nothing worth looking at in there,_ _**trust** _ _me._

Carolina can’t really fault him for that. “Well, find anything useful?”

_That’s what I’m looking for now. Trying to see if there’s anything in here about Charon that we can exploit but…eh. There’s a lot of shit to sift through. I’m trying to contain the spillover so I don’t just dump a bunch of data into your brain, you’re welcome for that._

“Time?”

 _I’ll tell you when._ Carolina gets that strange mental sidestep feeling she gets when Church splits his attention for a task without the supporting hardware of her armor. _Some of this stuff is Top Secret too, ONI-eyes only. It’s fuckin’ unbelievable how insecure their important shit is. I mean, no offense to you guys, but the facility they had me in was apparently a Level 3 Secure Facility, which they make sound like James Bond with guns that come out of the ceiling and shit. All you guys had to do was just walk right in. Not exactly an impenetrable fortress._

“There _was_ a gun that came out of the ceiling, actually.”

_Shit, seriously? Did you get it on video?_

“And you mean unsecure.”

_What?_

“Unsecure. You said insecure. That means something different.”

_What? No way. …oh damn, you’re right._

Carolina huffs out a wheezing laugh, a hand to her stomach. She’s been running too long, laughing is not good. “Is it time yet or not?”

_Oh yeah, you were done like twenty seconds ago. Cool down._

“You’re such an asshole,” Carolina sighs, slowing down to a walk for her last lap. The recruits at the edge of the track try not to be obvious at how they’re glancing at her as they begin their warmup stretches.

_Thank you, I do try._

She feels a tickle at the edge of her mind, a seeping of something like report summaries of _ring structure_ and _casualty reports_ and _diplomats on Sanghelios_ before that emptiness slides back in, separating her from the data dump. “Do you want me to find you a server?”

_Nah. None of this is urgent, I can just pick at it._

“I mean for your safety. Or comfort. If you unpack all of that, won’t you bog yourself down?”

_I can just delete any nonrelevant data, it’s not a big deal. Although maybe we should keep it? This sad little mudball of a colony planet probably hasn’t gotten a headline in years._

It’s likely. Carolina is about to say as much when the recruits nearby snap to attention. She follows their gaze to Washington jogging over to her in full armor. She’s still not sure what to feel about him either; they had some time to talk after everything with the Director, but things between them still get strained sometimes. He’s not the bumbling rookie she remembers so she’s still working on finding her place with him.

“Carolina,” he starts. Some things never change though. She can tell by the set of his shoulders and the hesitation in his voice that whatever news he’s come to deliver isn’t good. “There's a problem. Tucker and Caboose didn't check in.”

The info bleed screeches to a halt in the back of her head as all of Church's attention refocuses. Carolina knows the feeling. The burning tiredness in her limbs is replaced immediately with a shot of adrenaline and she's glad, so glad for Washington, who's already falling into step beside her as she storms from the track. “Tell me what happened.”

 


	2. Roided Out Mike Tysons

Consciousness ebbs back.

Tucker opens his eyes and sees spots of light, globs of dark. He closes them.

Opens them again, maybe seconds or hours later. Thoughts filter back like _get the fuck up stupid_ and _Grif will never let you hear the end of this_ because he’d crashed, and he’d boasted he wouldn’t crash and Grif had ribbed him and told him he would crash. Fuck. He’s going to have to take it because he totally crashed. His ears are ringing, high pitched and annoying. His attention crumbles like used up charcoal.

He goes back to sleep.

Next he _knows_ it’s only been a couple seconds because the light becomes fire and alarms and the dark is the jungle except for one blob, that one is Caboose. Caboose is usually pretty light colored. The fire and alarms made his blue armor look black, like Tex, like Tucker through the teleporter-

Tucker jerks up quick enough to make himself nauseous. Concussion. Yeah, yep. Definitely that, he can feel wetness in his hair. Plus the pain is a pretty good indicator.

The bay door had popped off the back of the Pelican at some point; there’s a lot of shit on fire but sunlight streams through the back. Get out, get into the sun. Tucker grabs Caboose and drags him through the open door onto the ground- oh fuck, the plane’s upside down. They _really_ crashed. Probably the only reason they aren’t a fireball is because they hit the ground _before_ falling off the cliff and turned their drop into a half-assed tumble instead of a straight nosedive.

“Caboose,” Tucker croaks. He doesn’t move. Tucker shakes Caboose’s shoulder and he still doesn’t move. Didn’t Wash show him how to pull up a biofeed on friendlies before? “Uh, do the…thing,” he slurs to his helmet, which doesn’t do the thing. Tucker bangs the side of it and regrets it almost immediately when it makes his head throb.

Caboose’s stats come up and it’s that red blinking **RESPIRATORY FAILURE** that has Tucker scrambling for his helmet seals, then Caboose’s. _Not breathing._ Not breathing-

Tucker leans over and pinches Caboose’s nose shut, exhales twice, leans back to take a few breaths because holy fucking _shit_ he’s really dizzy, shit, he’s gonna pass out, leans down and breathes again, and again, until he thinks he’s going to stop breathing too and then Caboose is jerking hard and coughing into his mouth. Which is disgusting.

“There you go,” Tucker gasps, sitting back on his heels and bracing himself with his hands on his knees, the edges of his vision fuzzing to black. Don’t faint. _Do not faint._

“Eww, Tucker kissed me,” Caboose coughs raggedly as he blinks up at the canopy overhead, dazed.

“Yeah, wasn’t a walk in the park for me either,” Tucker mutters. “You’re welcome for saving your life, stupid.” He takes a few more seconds to reaffirm that yes, he’s conscious and probably staying that way before reaching up to touch the sore spot on his head. Sticky, but not still bleeding. Probably isn’t a really bad concussion. He finds his helmet and slots it back on, holding out Caboose’s helmet for him to take before stumbling back over to the wrecked Pelican. “Fuck,” he says, with feeling, because there’s no way the ship is taking back off. He finds Freckles buzzing angrily near an open flame and pulls him away before heading over to check the console. Dead. “Double fuck.”

“I don’t like plane crashes,” Caboose calls from the ground.

“That’s the general consensus.” Hilariously enough the radio is perfectly safe in its harness, dangling overhead. Seatbelts really do save lives. Tucker clamps Freckles to the magstrip on his other thigh and reaches up to wrestle the radio loose, dragging it back over to where Caboose is lying and plunking it down before sinking to his knees again. “They say that any landing you can walk away from is a good one.”

“I don’t think anybody ever says that,” Caboose murmurs as he closes his eyes, brow furrowing.

“Put your helmet back on.” Tucker fiddles with the radio, trying to remember the frequency for Armonia’s main comm line through the roaring static in his brain. He can practically feel it pulsing inside of his skull, feverish and inflamed and that just makes him think of that Sir Woggles thing outside the Pelican which does _not_ help with the nausea. “Hey, I said put it on. We’re in a combat zone.”

“I’m not combating anybody,” Caboose protests, but slowly and painfully pulls his helmet back on and locks the seals after a few clumsy tries. “My head hurts.”

“Join the club.” Tucker curses and smacks the radio again when all he gets is static. “Ugh, this is such _bullshit!_ Work, motherfucker!”

“Please don’t yell,” Caboose moans.

“Shut up! If we don’t get this radio working soon we’re gonna be screwed. They might not send anybody after us for fucking _hours,_ and we could be long dead before they show up!”

Caboose rolls onto his side and stares down at the radio. Tucker stills, waiting to see if his freakish robot-whispering power or whatever will take over and miraculously turn the radio into like a motorcycle or something that they can ride all the way back to Armonia. Or fuck, just make the goddamn thing work, Tucker’ll take that.

“Did you try calling collect?”

Tucker drops his head into his hands.

“Freckles knows how to phone home.” Caboose grabs his assault rifle from Tucker’s leg and slowly pushes himself until he’s sitting upright, cradling the gun in his lap. “Don’t you Freckles?”

“ _ **AFFIRMATIVE.**_ ”

“What?! Damn it Freckles, why didn’t you tell me before?!”

“ _ **YOU DIDN’T ASK.**_ ”

“I hate your stupid gun,” Tucker hisses. Caboose gets the frequency out of Freckles after some cajoling and ego-soothing and Tucker bends over the radio, thumb pressed against the transmit switch so hard he’s worried he’ll break it. “Armonia? Anybody there? This is Captain Tucker and _ho-hoooly shit_ we are in serious trouble! Come in!”

Seconds of static-y silence. Tucker holds his breath. His grip on the side of the radio makes the casing creak-

“Captain Tucker! Good god man, where have you _been?_ We’ve been attempting to contact you for the better part of an hour!”

Tucker could cry, he could seriously cry. Doyle’s froufrou accent has never sounded so sweet. “Yeah, probably haven’t been able to because our Pelican is fucked. Look, we’re out a ride and there is some _voodoo bullshit_ going on in this place, I don’t even know.”

There’s a clatter of noise in the background and then Washington’s voice comes over the line, crisp and no-nonsense. Tucker feels everything jittery inside of him calm immediately. “Tucker. Status.” Wash in Freelancer mode can be a huge prick but Freelancer Wash also gets shit _done_ and as he was so fond of saying in the canyon, all he wants is to protect them. Tucker usually doesn’t like being the damsel but in this case he will absolutely play that role with motherfucking _aplomb_.

“Agent Washington!” Caboose grabs at the radio too and Tucker has to jerk his hand back before Caboose crushes it. “Agent Washington, the pompom jellyfish crashed the plane!”

Tucker lets the silence sit on the line just long enough so Wash knows what he’s been dealing with all day. “Believe it or not, he’s actually right. There were these weird _things_ Wash, I don’t even know what they were.”

“Weapons?”

“No like, animals. But not- I dunno dude. And they smelled fuckin’ awful, like roadkill and shit and some of the bigger ones exploded and I guess they jammed up some vents or whatever with guts or something?”

“ _Exploded?_ ” Wash’s voice quiets when asks, “What does that sound like?”

“We’ve seen nothing like that since colonizing,” Doyle mutters.

“Well they definitely blew up because they jacked up our ride. We went down right after that, there’s _no_ way this thing is flying again.”

“There is a lot of fire,” Caboose adds helpfully.

“Okay. Are the two of you all right to move?”

“Yeah.” Tucker glances up at Caboose. “Yeah, we’re good to move.”

“You need to find cover, first and foremost. Are the ruins a defensible structure?”

“The _ruins?_ Christ, I don’t know. They’re all nasty and it _reeks_ in there and-” Tucker freezes. The smell from the plane was the same as the one from inside the ruins. “Oh shit, no seriously, it’s not defensible. I think those things are hanging out in there too.”

“Inside the _temple?_ Did you encounter them in there?”

“No, it was only in the jungle. Caboose saw one of them just outside; I was all in there and it was gross but there wasn’t anything alive. It just stank the same way these things stink.” Tucker shifts his weight on his knees with a hiss of pain. “I found some camp stuff from some mercs deeper inside. I think it was recent. I grabbed their radio- that’s what I’m on now since the ship is toast.”

“ _Buttered_ toast,” Caboose affirms.

“Okay.” Wash takes a moment and Tucker thinks he hears him take a breath too. “Okay. Head to the ruins anyway. Even if those things came from inside, it’ll be easier to defend your position than just wandering around in the jungle. Get up onto the roof if it’s stable enough; that’s your best chance for being able to see what’s around you, and you’ll be most visible from the sky up there. Do you have any flares?”

“Uh, I think so, I think there’s some in the Pelican.”

“Grab them. And take the radio with you too, and any additional weapons and ammunition you can salvage from the crash. Don’t load yourselves down so much that you can’t run, though. There’s no reason to think whatever attacked you won’t come back again.”

Tucker’s skin crawls at the prospect. “Dude, don’t jinx it.”

“Agent Washington?” Caboose asks, leaning closer to the radio. “Is anybody coming to get us?”

Wash’s voice goes soft in the way it does only for Caboose. “ _I’m_ coming to get you, buddy. We’re gonna get out of there and come back home together, as a team.”

Tucker hesitates. “Hey, Caboose. Go see if you can find some ammo for Freckles in the Pelican.”

“But it’s on fire.”

“It’s fine, it’s not near the fuel tanks. Just be careful, all right?” As soon as Caboose moves away Tucker turns back to the radio, lowering his voice. “Wash, there’s something really fucking _weird_ about the ruins. They don’t look like they were made for Sangheili, everything’s too small. And the bedrolls and stuff I found look like they weren’t used for a few days. There is something _really fuckin’ weird_ going on.”

“I think it’s pretty safe to assume that whatever attacked you probably killed those pirates,” Wash agrees grimly. “Which means they’re dangerous.”

“Fuck yeah they’re dangerous, they crashed the fucking dropship!”

“Tucker.” There’s a pause and Tucker knows Wash is waiting for him to calm down before continuing. “I’m going to get out there as soon as I can. Anything else we need to handle can be handled later. You just keep yourself and Caboose alive; that is your one and only objective.”

“Yeah,” Tucker grunts, though he does feel better. Just staying alive is something they’ve become kind of adept at. “Right. Yeah, I got it.”

“You can do this, all right? You don’t need anybody to protect you.”

“It’d be kind of nice though. Y’know, just this once.”

Wash chuckles. “Yeah, I’ll bet. I’ll make sure the steed I ride in on is adequately impressive.”

“Good, because I deserve the _best._ ”

 

* * *

 

Kimball and Doyle, despite their truce, still spend the majority of their days avoiding each other. Running interference between them was incredibly exhausting, considering almost every conversation turned into an argument. She’d thought that the Reds and Blues bickering with each other was annoying, but at least there isn’t a mist of vitriol hanging in the air between them as they trade verbal blows. Putting them together in the same room to deliver bad news was just _asking_ for an argument to break out.

That’s why Carolina had volunteered to bring the news to Kimball’s attention, while Wash left to inform Doyle and then bring him to sit on the comms while they hashed out a plan of action.

It was a good thing they’d agreed on the split approach, because hearing that her most trusted Captain could be in danger had put the New Republic general in a mood nowhere near the vicinity of ‘good.’ Vanessa Kimball, like Carolina, was a woman of action so Carolina knew what to say…not that there was much to say when more of your friends could die. Losing Tucker and Caboose would be more than just losing friends, too. The soldiers looked up to them; it would cripple overall morale.

For Carolina, at least, it’s easier to think in quantifiable consequences like _troop morale_ and _combatant numbers_ than thinking of losing more people, after fighting for so long to remember how to hold onto them.

 _Just got a ping from the comms, unknown frequency,_ Church drones. There’s another problem; the AI had been nearly silent since Wash crashed the track almost an hour ago. Carolina had pulled on her armor before reporting to Kimball to provide for Epsilon the additional hardware he’d need to really _work_ but as far as she could tell, all he’d done is split his attention to monitor every communications channel he could access in Armonia. Which is a little creepy.

 _It’s Tucker and Caboose._ Carolina changes direction immediately when Church drops a marker on her HUD. _Doyle picked up in the main tower; Wash is on the horn with them now._

Carolina arrives at the tail end of Wash's conversation with Caboose. She catches “Listen to Tucker” and “make sure he doesn't wander off” before Washington pushes away from the console and heads for the north exit at a clipped pace.

“Wash,” Carolina starts as she falls into step beside him.

“They're both all right.” Wash has that tight pull to his voice, the one that wasn't there during the Project. Carolina's had to get used to that. “Their Pelican was attacked by some unknown life forms. I'm heading out to pick them up.”

“You need to clear that with Kimball and Doyle first-”

“Doyle was standing right there when I told them, he could have interrupted me if he disagreed with my course of action.” _There's_ a tone she _does_ take offense to. “There's no point in wasting time, it's just a pickup.”

“Wash _stop_.” There's a moment where Carolina thinks he won't, but then Wash halts and turns on his heel. She can't see his glare behind the helmet but she can taste his impatience in the air and it makes her limbs itch, makes her want to move and solve his problem for him. “You need to calm down. We should at least try to figure out how or why they were attacked; you could be heading into a war zone.”

Wash shifts his weight, almost imperceptibly. “Tucker described them. Doyle said they don't sound like any indigenous animals he's ever seen, and they don't sound like any alien species we've come across.” Wash sighs, giving in and relaxing enough that Carolina doesn't have to worry about him bolting for the motorpool. “Caboose called some of them 'pompom jellyfish' but I don't know anything that-”

“Wait,” Church's voice snaps suddenly out of her suit’s external speakers and Carolina feels a stab of alarm that gets her heart racing. He'd been low-key agitated since Wash had first given them the news but this is new, this is almost panic. “What else? What'd Tucker say about it?”

“Not much. I think he might’ve been concussed. Something about them exploding, some awful smell-”

“...fuck. _Fuck._ There's no- but I mean it makes sense, if they were just choosing planets on whether or not they met the criteria-”

“Epsilon, slow down and explain,” Carolina growls, fingers flexing in her fists as his anxiety bleeds into her own.

Church's avatar finally winks on, gripping its sniper rifle tight. “Get back to the comm room and get Kimball in there yesterday. I need five minutes and a bigger display than what your suit has to offer.”

 

* * *

 

The forest is dense and does absolutely nothing to help Tucker see, which makes him nervous. There could literally be a tentacle death pod thing behind every gigantic leaf and he wouldn’t know until it did something X-rated to his face.

“Caboose, shut up.”

Not to mention that everything on the ground is apparently made out of glass, given how loud the crunching is as they tromp over leaves and twigs and vines and roots and other jungley shit. In fact, they might as well set off a flare every fifth step for all the stealth they’re currently employing.

“ _Caboose._ Shut up.”

And then there’s Caboose. Tucker makes it to the count of four before exploding. “Caboose! Stop fucking humming! You’re gonna give away our position!”

“Tucker, you are _yelling._ That’s way louder than humming.”

“I’m yelling because you won’t shut the fuck up!”

Caboose gives a wounded little sniff, but at least he’s quiet. Tucker’s still hyper aware of just how much noise the two of them are making, crashing through the underbrush like this. He keeps his rifle up, swinging it around to bear any time he hears a twig snap that isn’t the direct result of either he or Caboose. He can’t stop thinking about how that thing had toddled toward them, just made straight for their plane. It didn’t even have any fucking _eyes,_ how did it know they were there? Did those things have some kind of hive mind or-

“Freckles, run a scan,” Tucker mutters.

It says a lot that Freckles actually listens to him this time. “ _ **NO HOSTILE FORCES DETECTED.**_ ”

That didn’t mean anything. Freckles was late on the uptake last time too. Maybe these things were cold and didn’t show up on infrared, or maybe they moved so erratically that they couldn’t be picked up on motion sensors. Not to mention that they’re struggling through a jungle so thick Tucker can barely see the ground before he steps on it. Hell, those things could be climbing around in the trees above them, waiting to just drop on their heads and…do whatever they do. Besides explode.

They just have to make it to the ruins. That’s all they have to do.

It’s not even five minutes before Caboose starts humming again.

Tucker briefly considers shooting him and leaving him for dead. “ _Caboose_ ,” he growls, halting their march and turning to regard his teammate head on for a real, proper screaming match when he stops himself.

Caboose has Freckles clutched tight to his chest; not exactly ready for battle, but the posture screams ‘frightened child’ more than it reads capable soldier, a description that fits Caboose like a glove. All the indignation and anger seeps out of him _._ “Hey,” Tucker starts again, still gruff from his own nerves but making an effort to soften his tone into something more reassuring, “we’re gonna make it. Wash is already on his way.”

“And you have a plan,” Caboose adds, staring down at his teammate.

“Yeah,” Tucker answers, shouldering his rifle, trying really hard not to be affected by the nonchalant way Caboose just said that, like Tucker having a plan is a _good_ thing, a thing to find comfort in. “Yeah, I’ve got a plan. The plan is ‘get up on the roof and shoot anything that tries to hurt us.’ Sound like a good plan?”

Freckles whirs in agreement. “ _ **AFFIRMATIVE.**_ ”

“If Freckles likes the plan, then the plan is fine with me,” Caboose follows, nodding.

“Good, ‘cause that’s all we got. It’ll work.” Tucker reaches over and thumps Caboose on the arm. “But I need you to stay quiet. Think you could hum in your head?”

Caboose hesitates. “As loud as I want?”

“In your head, yeah.”

He nods. And then Freckles jerks up in his grip and fires a burst just over Tucker’s shoulder. Tucker does _not_ shriek as he jerks away from something wet and sloppy dropping out of the trees behind him, slapping onto the ground like wet bread. Freckles drones, “ _ **HOSTILE ELIMINATED.**_ ”

“Good boy Freckles,” Caboose chirps, clutching the smoking rifle close again.

Tucker swears under his breath and resumes the march. “I’m gonna die. I’m gonna die out here.”

 

* * *

 

“...Okay. I can see it.”

“Agreed.” Kimball nods along with Carolina. “Caboose’s description was surprisingly accurate. That _does_ look like a jellyfish with pompoms.”

“That,” Church explains grimly, small avatar popping up to pace alongside the diagram, “is a spore of a parasitic species called the Flood. And that shit is extremely bad news. Not just for Tucker and Caboose, but for the whole planet.”

Doyle wrings his hands at the edge of the table. “You’ll have to elaborate on that, please.”

“No surprise you guys haven’t heard of this; the UNSC is keeping it as hush as possible, especially from colonies. Fuck, _I_ wouldn’t know if I hadn’t lifted these files from storage.”

“Carolina and I haven’t heard anything either,” Wash adds, folding his arms. “Of course, we weren’t exactly kept up to date on much of anything after the Project was shut down.”

“The Master Chief ran up against these things and _reportedly_ eradicated them. Apparently some shit even went down on Earth, but this kind of news always piggybacks on something bigger with a lot more political ramifications and ends up getting buried. There was other shit going on, the Covenant was infighting- anyway.” Church clears his throat and his avatar fuzzes. Carolina frowns. What was that?

“All that shit doesn't matter; the point is that if this really is what they saw? There’s an infestation _here._ ” Church waves a hand and pulls up more diagrams; combat forms, cross sections, video logs of how the various Flood forms move and infect hosts. “This is what they do to even the smallest sentient populations. Human beings are like prime rib to these fuckers; if even _one_ spore flops its way into the city, we can pretty much kiss what’s left of Chorus goodbye.”

“So then we need to kill them. All of them.”

Church nods at Carolina. “Fire’s the best way. We need to napalm the shit out of that jungle, and everything else around it.”

“Tucker and Caboose,” Wash says insistently. “We need to get them out first.”

“Obviously,” Church snaps. “But huge rescue teams are a no go. More chance of someone getting infected and then giving the Flood _more_ bodies. Honestly, they’re probably _lucky_ the Pelican crashed. If those things had infected either of them, they could’ve hijacked the damn dropship right to our doorstep.”

“Do they have enough intelligence to do that?” Carolina asks incredulously.

“Don’t know. Sometimes. Reports are spotty and I don’t have the whole picture.”

“For us to mobilize that much manpower and equipment to burn that entire forest- if those things are already loose, it might already be too late,” Doyle points out.

“For once, I agree with Doyle.” Kimball leans on her hands against the table. “We’ll need to deploy a bomb. No nukes, but something with enough firepower to wipe out a lot of that jungle and set fire to the rest. I’ll have munitions cook something up.”

“But that means the window for rescuing Tucker and Caboose has gotten pretty damn small.” Church looks up at Carolina and his tone changes, shifts from _combat assist_ to _teammate and friend_ in that way that makes him sound so incredibly human. He must have sounded like that all the time with the Reds and Blues, long before she ever came around. “If they’re not at the LZ when we get there-”

“When _I_ get there,” Wash interrupts. “These things aren’t the only threat to Chorus. If Locus and Felix are watching and see the both of us leave, they’ll take the city in a heartbeat.”

Carolina and Kimball exchange glances.

“Agent Washington,” Doyle begins gently, “I understand your desire to rescue your men, but don’t you think-” He hesitates. “Rather, I wonder if Agent Carolina wouldn’t be better for the job.”

Wash stiffens. “Excuse me, General?”

“Wash,” Carolina steps up, holding out a hand. “If they can’t be extracted, we have to arm the bomb anyway. Regardless of how we feel about it.”

There’s a creak of armor and kevlar as Wash curls his hands into fists. “And you don’t think I would.”

Carolina hesitates a beat too long. “I don’t want to ask you to make that decision.”

Wash looks between Kimball and Doyle. Neither of them say a word. The atmosphere of the conference room chills and Carolina can see the internal conflict Wash suffers through the set of his feet, through the squaring of his shoulders as he lifts his chin. “They’ll be there.”

“Wash-”

“You need to stay,” Wash argues. “You have Epsilon. We need him to get that message to the UNSC. Even if you leave him behind- you just need to stay. You're the better option to protect the capital, if something should happen. I’ll go get them and I'll arm the bomb.”

Carolina glances at Doyle, then Kimball. “It’s up to you,” Kimball acquiesces. Carolina doesn’t know whether or not to be grateful for that trust.

“All right,” Carolina says lowly. She has reservations, but in front of the two generals is neither the time nor the place to voice them. “Then get going.”

Wash doesn't respond other than to turn on his heel and bolt for the door.

 

* * *

 

“Okay, there’s the thing.” Tucker coughs. It’s been a really long time since he’s actually had a drink of water and he’s thirsty as hell. How long could humans live without water again? A ridiculously short period of time. Like two days or something. “Wash said we should get to the roof.”

“There’re holes in the top,” Caboose points out. “We’ll fall in.”

“Let’s just get up there and see what we’re dealing with.”

The holes aren’t the result of decay as Tucker had thought when he'd seen them from inside the temple, but they were still huge, right in the middle and difficult to avoid. If they got into some kind of fight it’d be easy for one of them to misstep and fall right in. The good thing was that the only way onto the roof was to climb the nearby trees. Given how easily those things had swarmed all over the Pelican though, Tucker’s not sure that a little climbing is going to deter any of them.

Tucker unslings the radio from Caboose’s back and drops his own meager duffle of supplies he’d managed to scrape together. They had one canteen between them and only a couple of emergency ration bars, the first aid kit, some flares and just a few magazines of ammo for both their rifles. Not exactly a good setup for long-term survival.

It takes some time, but Tucker gets a line with spotty reception back to Armonia. “I think this place is fucking up our communications,” he says. “When I was inside earlier my radio cut out and I couldn’t even hear Caboose until I was practically out. I think it’s ‘cause the metal is all crazy and weird, it doesn’t look like the other alien junk on this planet.”

“That’s not s-s-ssurprising,” Church replies. Even with the AI scrubbing the signal his voice still comes in laden with static, despite Tucker banging a hand against the radio (the surest fix for a weak signal). “Those ruins specifically are probably more Forerunner shit.”

A branch snaps and Tucker whirls around, heart pounding. Nothing. “What?” He slings his rifle into his hands just in case.

“Yeah. You remember hearing about those ring th-ngs? It’s all Forerunner stuff. Apparently the Sangheili worshiped them even before the Covenant came along, so a lot of the worlds they occupied already had Forerunner crap all over place and they just expanded or built on top of-”

“Dude I’m sure that’s fascinating but I don’t fucking care. Is Wash on his way or not?”

“Just took off. Should be there in a few hours. See any m-re of-- things?”

Caboose shifts his weight over by the edge of the roof, looking oddly alert considering his usual method for playing lookout is to cover his eyes in the ‘can’t see them, can’t see me’ school of diligence. His good behavior is possibly even more unsettling than the things coming after them. “Just a couple. Maybe most of them died in the crash?”

“Maybe.” Church doesn’t sound convinced. “Uh, I mean tot--ly. They’re probably mostly dead.”

Tucker sighs. “Reassuring. Thanks Church.”

“Hey, I’m just being practical.” A pause, full of static and white noise before Church continues. “Are you both here? Caboose?”

“Church!” Caboose perks up and bounces over to crowd the radio, jostling Tucker away. “I’m here! I was listening!”

“Okay buddy, keep listening. …or whatever you do that looks like listening. Actually, just ask Tucker if y- don’t know anything.”

“Dude, don’t tell him that.”

“These things coming after you guys are bad news.”

“Yeah no shit! Church, _they wrecked our ride._ ”

“It’s more than that.” Church does one of his stupid dramatic pauses, more annoying than ever because now is not the goddamn time. “These things, the Flood? They inf-ct people.”

Tucker waits for further explanation. None follows. “What, like…give them germs or something? Is that what the exploding is, it's a germ explosion? Like sneezing?”

“No, I mean the little ones stab you in the neck and slither into your skull.”

“ _Jesus fuck!_ ”

“Well that sounds uncomfortable,” Caboose muses.

“I’ll say. They’ll probably give you a _splitting_ he-dache.”

“Church? Not now. Oh my god, not now. Are you serious about that?”

“Like a heart attack.” Church’s voice levels again. “So do not let them touch you. Don’t even let ‘em get close. There’s the little infectious forms, then the ones that exp---de to _spread_ the infectious forms, and then a bunch of other types where they’ve infected bodies or people and they’re like zomb-- and can punch like a roided out Mike Tyson.”

“Holy shit,” Tucker says faintly. “Haven’t seen any Mike Tysons yet.”

“Yeah, well, let’s hope it stays that way.” Church pauses. “Caboose, did you follow any of --at?”

“Don’t let Mike Tyson touch you in the brain because you will explode.”

“Close enough.” Static surges up like a downpour. “Just have Fr---les shoot anyth--- that’s not -ucker or Wash.”

“Okay!”

“We’d bet--r get off the radio. These --ings are attracted to noise. And Tucker?”

“Yeah, what?”

Church goes quiet for a suspiciously long time before he just says gruffly, “Don’t f-ck this up.”

“Thanks asshole.”

“I’m just saying.”

 

* * *

 

_Shit! What the hell was that?!_

“Yeah, I’d recognize those dulcet tones anywhere.” Felix pops back up from his crouch, flexing his fingers eagerly against the stock of his rifle. “Don’t know why Kimball would send _those_ morons to check out one of our camps, but this’ll be like taking morphine from a vegetable.”

Locus ignores Felix’s commentary and listens to the rest of the black box recording. No sound of either of the Freelancer’s voices; given that they’re usually the de facto leaders of the sim troopers, it’s unlikely that they wouldn’t be shouting instructions during a crash. And only the two separate sim troopers’ voices show up on the recording. It might only be the two of them. The blue idiot aside, Tucker has proven to be a problem. Taking him out here would be advantageous.

“Sir, I think they moved on from the crash site.”

“Holy shit, what gave it away? The lack of bodies? You’re a regular goddamn Sherlock, you know that? No- motherfucker, you’re practically _Miami CSI._ ”

The pirate sighed. “I’ll just go do a perimeter check.”

“Another brilliant suggestion! You go do that.” Felix watched the pirate skulk away before turning back to Locus and shaking his head. “ _Christ._ ”

Locus stands up. “Stop antagonizing the men.”

“Uh, I’ll stop antagonizing them when they start acting like men instead of bipedal bricks.” Felix jerks his chin toward the mess Locus had been examining. “The fuck is that supposed to be anyway?”

“I don’t know.”

Felix groans. “I _know_ you don’t know, the question was rhetorical. Nobody’s gonna fucking know what that is because it what it _looks_ like is a week old cum stain.”

“Go somewhere else, Felix,” Locus growls, already at the end of his patience.

“Sounds great. How about this: whoever finds and _kills_ these fuckers first gets a prize. Like the other guy’s best gun or a week of servitude.” Felix flicks off the safety on his battle rifle and storms into the jungle edge.

Locus takes a warning step after him. “Felix-”

“Contest starts now!”

Locus listens to the lack of noise Felix makes moving through the jungle and considers taking the men and just leaving him there. He could die by whatever had downed the Pelican, or perhaps the sim troopers will manage to pull another stunning victory out of their helmets and kill him.

Locus _almost_ wants it to happen. The temptation is strong.

“You,” he growls over his shoulder, pointing after Felix with his rifle. “Go with him.”

The soldiers under their command follow his orders without question and this one is no different. As Locus watches the soldier’s armor disappear into the thicket he wonders if it’s because they all think _he_ is the one two seconds away from snapping and killing them all. No, that dubious honor goes to Felix. Locus- well.

He'll at least need an order. And some sound reasoning behind it, if he can get it.

But the downed Pelican _does_ present a lot more questions than answers. There’s no blood, no bodies and no clues except for the repulsive substance clogging up one of the main intake valves and littering the ground. Even with the air filters scrubbing his oxygen and the stench of burning fuel, Locus can smell it. It smells like rot, like corpses and mold and swamp.

What _is_ it?

_Sir._

Locus chins his radio mic. “Report.”

_There’s more of that weird shit up on the plateau. Stinks like hell. I think this is where they’d parked the ship, there’s jet scuff on the rocks._

“Make a note and then get back down here.” Locus swings his sniper rifle over his shoulder. “We’re going after the sim troopers.”

 


	3. Rain Man

“Oh…oh my.”  Flinch.  “Heavens, that looks _highly_ uncomfortable.  No- oh my gracious, no.  No!”

“Doyle,” Church snaps, folding his tiny arms, “if it’s gonna bother you this much, _stop looking at it._ ”  He waves a hand to dismiss the cross-section of a Flood spore infecting a host.  “I swear to god, you like this shit.  You probably get off on disturbing yourself.”

“I do absolutely no such thing!” Doyle protests.  “I am simply trying to impress upon myself the seriousness of the situation.”

“Right, because _you’re_ the poster child for carefree.”  Church paces a lazy circle around the edge of the table.  “What’re you really doing?  Truth light.”

Doyle leans forward, pressing his weight into his hands as they grip the lip of the table’s divot.  His fingers interfere with the projectors and make the readouts fuzz.  “Epsilon.”  He pauses and amends, “Church.  These are your friends out in the field.”  He glances up at the avatar, brow furrowed.  “How do you rate their chances of survival?”

Church slows his pacing.  “…math doesn’t really apply to these guys.  Trust me, I have tried to hell and back to quantify this bullshit.  Their chances of survival don’t really gel with numbers anymore.”

“Is it that hopeless?”

Church scoffs.  “I never said that.”

“You must understand, these things must be taken into account,” Doyle says gravely, head bowed. 

Church turns to stare up at Doyle, hands clenching at his sides.  “…Motherfucker, are you-”

The door swishes open and Carolina strides in, Kimball on her heels.  “Wash just checked in.  We should hear back from him about the Blues in the next couple hours.”  Carolina zeroes in on the tense posture of Church’s avatar, then snaps her gaze to Doyle.  “What?  What’s happened?”

Church waves an arm angrily.  “General Doyle here thinks we should bomb the ruins right away.”

Doyle begins, “I didn’t-” but Kimball is already there, full of fire.

“General Doyle, we absolutely _will not_ destroy that jungle without at least checking to see if Tucker and Caboose can be extracted!”

“I wasn't suggesting that,” Doyle argues, leaning forward against the table again.  “I don’t want these men to die any more than you do!”

“Really?  Because you asking me to number crunch their lives sort of sounds like you wouldn’t be all that choked up about it,” Church snaps back.

“Church,” Carolina warns.

“He did!”

“I was asking you as their _friend,_ ” Doyle insists.  “I want to believe that they are both alive and well, and will be there when Agent Washington arrives.  But we cannot appropriately assess at this situation and refuse to consider the worst-case scenario as it approaches our very doorstep!”

Kimball throws her hands up.  “You aren’t the only one with Chorus’s best interests at heart!  The Reds and Blues are also included in that, _Tucker and Caboose_ are included in that!”

Doyle drags a hand down the face of his helmet.  “Ms. Kimball, we have more than their lives to consider.  The people of this capital, _our_ people, are relying on us to make sound decisions to keep them alive.  We already have Charon’s men at our heels!”

“Which is why we can’t afford to lose any more,” Kimball hisses through gritted teeth.

“You are allowing yourself to be blinded by ideals rather than to face reality,” Doyle sighs pushing off of the table.  “No different than before, I suppose.”

“Oh, that means _so much_ coming from you, the stalwart defender of systematic oppression!”

“Enough,” Carolina interrupts with a slam of her fist on the projection table.  Church’s avatar fritzes but she ignores his indignant yelp.  “General Doyle, do you or don’t you trust Agent Washington’s judgment?”

Doyle shifts his weight uneasily.  “Of course I do, naturally.”

“Then you shouldn’t have any worries about whether or not the job will get done.”  Carolina straightens, folds her arms tight over her chest.  “Washington is a professional; he’ll do what’s best for Chorus.”

The quiet before Doyle’s answer says everything he doesn’t, and Kimball’s shoulders bunch as she turns away from him, troubled.  “As you say.”

 

* * *

 

“Tucker, your plan is boring.”  Caboose kicks a rock off the roof and Tucker considers killing him and spreading out the body parts as a distraction.  He could totally say the Flood did it- shit, no he couldn’t.  Church said they take over bodies, not rip them to pieces.  “Super, _super_ boring.  Man, I have never ever been so bored. Ever. Most boring plan ever, of all time.”

“Hey Caboose, if you’re bored, how about you go scout around?  Far away from me.”

“Um, I would do that except I don’t want to be alone?  So I won’t do that, thank you, please.”

“Then _shut up._ ”  Tucker shoulders his rifle, hand on his hip.  “Seriously, boring is _good_ right now.  If we weren’t bored, then we’d be fighting for our lives or dying.  I, personally, would like to do neither of those things!”

“Tucker.”

“I mean, it’s like you have no idea the kind of trouble we’re in.  You really don’t, do you?  Nowhere in that empty head of yours is there even an _idea_ of the depth of the shit we’ve stepped into.  You get what’s going to happen, right?  If we don’t get picked up soon, we’re either gonna become fucking tentacle puppets _or,_ what’s probably gonna happen is Kimball and Doyle are gonna reach the conclusion that two stupid soldiers aren’t worth risking the entire population, and they’re gonna bomb this forest with us in it!”

“Church didn’t say-”

“Of course he didn’t fucking say it!  Who would say that to their buddies when there’s nothing they can do?  ‘Hey guys, just an FYI, there’s a good chance you’re also gonna get teamkilled by your own bosses if they decide to play it safe.’  Why would he bother telling us when all we can do is freak out?!”

“Sooo…are you freaking out?”

“ _No fucking duh!_   Kimball and Doyle are probably gonna roast us because that’s what _anybody_ in their position would do when they’re facing an entire planetary fuck-you infection!  Don’t you watch zombie movies?  They always bomb the huge cities first so _yes!_   Yes!  _I am freaking out!_ ”

“Oh, that’s good,” Caboose says placidly, “because I’m pretty sure we’re under attack.”

One moment Tucker’s looking at Caboose; the next he’s pressed down to the roof with a crushing weight on him, his back throbbing in pain.  Tucker hears the sound of gunfire overhead like they’re underwater and then the weight is gone, and he’s rolling away and yanking the sword hilt from his hip to ignite it before he realizes that the roof is quickly becoming overrun by-

“I think that’s a Mike Tyson!” Caboose hollers, Freckles’ muzzle smoking.

Church’s description might’ve been bare-bones, but even knowing what was coming still didn’t prepare Tucker for this.  The things coming at him are, without a doubt, infected Sangheili.  “How the fuck- _how the fuck-_ ” Tucker gasps as he slices through one of the forms.  Its arm drops off and seeps into the roof but it still stumbles for him, pushing itself up with its stump when it falls.

“ ** _INCOMING HOSTILES DETECTED._** ”

“Mother _fucker_!”  Tucker stabs at another form when it takes a swing at his head.  The staccato snap of assault rifle fire is a comfort, but when Tucker finally has a second to breathe and sees the combat forms climbing up the trees, leaping from the branches to the rooftop, he realizes with a sinking feeling that if they stay there, they’re going to die.  Every time he turns around there’s another Flood form heaving itself over the edge of the roof, flying up as if launched from a trampoline, almost kind of funny-looking except for the stench and the tentacles writhing from their mouth-ish areas in a way that makes Tucker think _oh, god, I know how those got there._   He cuts another’s face off and all he can see is Junior smiling, Junior growling with twinkling eyes and clicking teeth as he forms his mouth around words that weren’t made for it, for Tucker’s sake.  He stabs through another and it poofs, like mushroom spores.  Three more take its place.

They have to abandon the LZ.

“Caboose!  Clear a path that way, we’re bailing!”

Caboose has to shout over the sound of gunfire, “But Wash is supposed to pick us up!”

“He’s going to be picking up our _pieces_ if we don’t go!”  Tucker cuts down another and he’s starting to lose count.  The things go down easy when it comes to his sword, but it sounds like Freckles has to empty an entire clip into each one before it collapses.  The pile of dead bodies around Caboose is much smaller, the violently reanimated crowd closing in on him with flailing limbs and gurgling rage.

Tucker presses in the direction of his teammate, separated by only a handful of combatants when he sees one of them club Caboose in the back and send him flying.  Freckles disappears into the fray and Tucker makes it over to Caboose with only moments to spare, grabbing him and pulling him onto his feet.  “Freckles!” Caboose cries, lunging.

Tucker catches him round the chest and spins him, pushing him toward the edge.  “No time!  We gotta go!”

“But Freckles-!”

“ _CABOOSE!_ ”  Tucker shoves Caboose off of the roof and jumps down after him, rolling to soften the impact before grabbing up his teammate and tearing off into the jungle, Caboose thankfully just steps behind him.  He glances back at the confused swarms milling about the temple; two waiting to leap onto the roof had caught on and barreled into the forest after them.  Tucker waits until they’re out of sight of the temple to turn and dispatch of them as quickly as possible, then grabs Caboose’s shoulder and urges him into running again. 

Rain comes without warning, dripping past the canopy to slap fat droplets against their helmets and armor; Tucker and Caboose start to lose their footing on the slippery jungle floor, sliding over fallen leaves, boots sticking into thick mud.  Still they run, Tucker straining to listen for the Flood’s howls over the roar of the storm pouring down around them in waves.

They stop finally when Tucker is gasping, both soldiers staggering into trees and slumping to the ground.  “Shit.  _Shit._ ”  Tucker’s fingers slip in the mud as he tries to find purchase to stand up so he stays down.  Staying down is good.  “ _Shit!_ ”

Caboose straightens up first, pacing through the thick of the rain and the jungle, wringing his hands and making small sounds in the back of his throat.  “Freckles…Freckles is back with the Mike Tysons…We need to get Freckles back, he’s not so good at making new friends…”

“We are not going back for Freckles,” Tucker pants, finally on his feet, half bent with his hands braced against his knees.

“Freckles is my friend!”

“ _Freckles_ isn’t their food!” Tucker barks.  “They’re not gonna do anything to him.  If we go back, we’re lunchmeat!”

Caboose stomps his foot.  “I don’t want to leave friends behind, even if they aren’t lunchmeat!”

Tucker takes a few deep breaths and counts to five.  “Caboose, we _are not going back._   We’ll freaking die if we go back, and then there’ll be _nobody_ to save Freckles.”

Caboose stares silently, mutinous.  Water slides over his visor and along the grooves of his armor.

“End of discussion, got it?  That’s it.  No more talking about it.”  Tucker finally snaps the hilt of his sword to the magstrip on his thigh, busying himself with not looking Caboose in the face.

Caboose is quiet long enough to give Tucker the hope that maybe he’ll drop the subject, but no such luck.  Of-fucking-course, he has to open his goddamn mouth again and say the one thing Tucker had been hoping he wouldn’t mention:

“Our friends keep dying.”

_God damn it._

When Tucker looks up Caboose is no longer staring at him, instead concentrating on tugging at the fingers of his gloves.  “All our machine friends.  All our human friends.  Sometimes even our alien friends.  They go somewhere and they don’t come back.”  Caboose glances up quickly before resuming his study of his gauntlets.  “But I know where Freckles is.  I can go to him, so…”

“Caboose,” Tucker starts.

“I don’t want this to be like with Church.”  Caboose’s shoulders hitch up.  “His body fell out of the car and I didn’t go back for it, so maybe that’s why-”

“No,” Tucker snaps, taking a step toward Caboose and jabbing a finger against his chestplate.  “ _Hell_ no.  Out of all the shit you’ve fucked up and refuse to take the blame for, that's _not_ one of them, got it?  Church died because he was obsessed with crap that didn’t even matter anymore, because he let himself get talked into a suicide run.  Even if you didn’t lose his body he’d still be dead.”

Caboose plucks at his fingertips.  The rain cascades over their armor in sheets.

“Shit, Caboose.”  Tucker leans back and rubs a hand over the top of his helmet, disrupting the water that had collected in the seams.  “I didn’t even know you still remembered that.”

“I forget sometimes,” Caboose admits.

“Forget it all the time.  It’s not your fault.”  Tucker blows out a breath against his visor.

He hadn’t been there for all that bullshit, he hadn’t been there when Church had finally found out he was a computer program and he hadn’t been there to talk his best friend out of pulling some idiot move and leaving the rest of them behind.  He’d been in the desert, fighting for his life over some dusty shitty temple that didn’t even turn out to be all that important.

He should never have taken that diplomat detail.  He got to reunite with Junior and he wouldn’t want to trade that for anything, but everything else went to hell while he was gone.  What could he have changed if he’d come back sooner?  If he’d just _stayed?_

Tucker repeats himself for his benefit as much as Caboose’s.  “It’s not anybody’s fault.”  That’s not true either, but there’s no time to talk about it.  They need to get moving.  After a moment of serious deliberation, Tucker unslings the battle rifle from his back and holds it out for Caboose to take.

“No thank you,” Caboose mutters down to his muddy toes.

“As sure as I am that this is gonna end with me patching up a gunshot wound in my ass, take it.  These Flood things are too dangerous to take on without a gun.”  Tucker fights the urge to duck and cover when Caboose reluctantly takes the weapon and clutches it like a security blanket.  “Now come on.  We’ve gotta find somewhere _else_ defensible so we can-” 

…No.  Tucker’s hands fly to his side, to his shoulder.  _No._   “Fuck!  Fucking _fuck!_ ”  Tucker slaps his hands over his visor and screams behind clenched teeth. 

Caboose gives him a warily startled look, holding the rifle even tighter.  “Tucker?”

Tucker kicks a tree as hard as he can.  Now, _now_ they’re dead, now they’re actual goners.  He’d panicked and just up and _left all of it-_ “All of our supplies are back there!  The fucking _radio_ is still back there!  God _damn_ it, we’re _so fucking screwed!_ ”

 

* * *

 

The rain makes for a dreary march, which Felix does not appreciate.  Conflict, sure, that’s fine.  But _depression?_   Fuck that.  “Shin bone connected to the, _knee bone._   Knee bone connected to the, _thigh bone._   Thigh bone connected to the, _dick bone._ ”  Luckily, he has a beautiful singing voice.

“I’m pretty sure the song doesn’t go like that.”

Felix whirls around and shoves the barrel of his rifle into the face of the tagalong trailing along behind him.  “Did I ask you?  No.”

The pirate shrugs.  Water sluices through the creases in his armor.  “I’m just saying.  Not how that song goes.”

Felix grumbles and turns back around.  “There’s no such thing as a knee bone anyway, it’s cartilage.”

“There’s the kneecap.  That’s a bone.”

Felix takes a mental tally of all the knives on his person.  Some people cope by counting to ten; Felix counts to twenty-seven.  Their visibility is fucked by the storm, Locus is being more of an ass than usual and he just _had_ to send the most annoying pirate _not_ afraid of Felix after him.  He probably did it on purpose, the prick.  _Fourteen.  Fifteen._ “Shut up and get a lock on our position.  Are we near the temple or not?”

“A dick doesn’t have a bone either.”

 _Sixteen._ “Oh really?  Because you know, you can _break_ your dick.  I would know, as I have broken a lot of dicks.  Wanna see how?”

The pirate leans back warily.  “Temple’s about five kilometers ahead of us, give or take.  Rain’s causing some interference.  We’re almost there.”

“Perfect.”  Much as Felix hates to admit it, apparently Tucker has a brain somewhere in that hormone-soaked skull of his.  He’ll probably go immediately for shelter after a crash like that, especially in this weather.  Thankfully he’s not so smart that he’s unpredictable; he just gets _lucky_ occasionally _._   “Then we’re double-timing it.  I am _not_ losing…”  Felix pauses, squinting off toward the east.  “You see that?”

“See _what?_   It’s pouring.”

“Shut up!” Felix hisses.  He jerks his rifle toward thicker cover, crouching down low and wedging himself against a tree as the pirate ducks beneath a large flowering plant.  The distinct drone of a Pelican flying low overhead precedes its appearance, but just barely.  The storm is likely obscuring their position from any possible sensors; the Pelican doesn't bank or turn after it passes overhead, so they must have eluded detection.  Felix chins his radio mic, just to be safe.  “How much you want to bet that’s the cavalry?”

_I wouldn’t take that bet, sir._

“Damn right you wouldn’t.”  Felix peers through the scope on his rifle.  “Can’t ID the pilot from here.  Time to follow this bad boy and see who’s gatecrashing our party.”

The pirate leans forward out of cover once the Pelican is clear.  _What about the sim troopers?_

“You see that trajectory?  It’s headed right for the temple, that must be the LZ.”  Felix pumps his fist, popping up from his cover excitedly.  “ _Perfect._   Locus is so gonna owe me for this one.  I’m taking that fancy shotgun of his.  Get your ass in gear Wolkowsky, we’ve got some slaughterin’ to do!”

The pirate follows Felix reluctantly through the dripping undergrowth.  “My name’s not Wolkowsky…”

 

* * *

 

It takes Wash only moments to draw a conclusion. 

Even while trying to land in a downpour, the bodies had been obvious.  Chunks of rotting Flood forms stew in the heat of a jungle storm; not even the rain could completely dissuade the stench from rising.  Landing the Pelican on the only section of rooftop _without_ corpses or holes had been challenging, even moreso when his eyes stung with tears from how damn _potent_ the smell was.

Still, there are only bodies.  Only bodies, no living combatants (to certain values of the word ‘alive’) but Tucker and Caboose are nowhere to be found.  Wash turns in a quick circle, rifle up like he’s expecting them to just appear out of thin air; it wouldn’t be out of character for Caboose to show up when he least expects it but he doesn’t, and neither does Tucker because they’re _not goddamn here._  

They're supposed to be here. They're supposed to _be-_

Washington spies a radio near the center of the rooftop and he crouches next to it, testing the controls.  Still working.  It must have been abandoned in a hurry…or it was no longer deemed necessary.  There are enough Flood bodies here to indicate a serious skirmish, but if Flood spores infect and take over their host bodies and Tucker and Caboose aren’t _here_ then-

Beside the radio, a duffle.  Wash opens it and feels his heart plummet.  Extra ammo, supplies and flares.  Everything he'd told them to grab, everything Tucker and Caboose would need to survive out here.  They’d left it all behind.

...He could try their team frequency.  If they’re within range, they’ll pick up.  They might’ve just had to temporarily abandon their position.  _It’s fine, they’re still alive, they’re still somewhere._ “Tucker, Caboose?  This is Washington, do you read me?”

Static.  “Tucker, Caboose, respond if you can hear this transmission.”

At the answering silence, Washington cups a hand over his external mic to reduce the sound of the rainfall. Maybe they can’t hear him.  Maybe they think it’s static, the storm’s loud enough, it could be that, easy.  “Guys I need a response _now._   Anything.  Use the ping system if you can’t talk, it’s in the bottom corner, the- the little flashing icon that looks like a WiFi signal.”  Wash holds his breath. 

Lets it back out.

Draws another.  “Tucker?  Caboose?  Do you read?”

If he lets his mind fool him, he can assume that the fuzz of static from the radio is hiding their voices.  That every crackle, every swell of white noise is just an attempt to communicate, to reach him through the interference but following that thread feels too much like the nights he sat up with his radio on in the hospital, waiting for someone, _any_ one to call him and tell him they’re on their way.  It feels too much like waiting for nothing.  It feels too much like more of the same.

The seconds tick by.  Washington’s voice cracks when he begs.  “Guys, _please._ ”

It can’t.  It _can’t_ be more of the same.

_I can’t do this again._

“Well, well, well!”

Washington spins around, staring down familiar steel and orange armor through the sights of his rifle.  For one terrifying second he considers instead of the Flood, _Felix_ getting his hands on the Blues and he doesn’t know which possibility is worse.  “Felix.  Do you always announce your presence to an enemy first, or just when you’re feeling particularly stupid?”

“Just when they’re not much of a threat,” Felix answers cheerfully before his foot nudges the spongey arm of a Flood form.  He jerks back and makes a show of wiping his boot off against the roof.  “Ugh.  This what all your parties look like the morning after?  I do _not_ envy your parents.”

Washington squeezes the stock of his rifle.  “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing you’re doing.  Checking the place out, looking for a couple of morons.”  Felix’s stance is easy and liquid, but his grip on his rifle is sure.  Washington can’t underestimate him.  Part of this stupid show is probably to get him to do just that.  “Honestly, I was just gonna shank those two bozos and call it a day, but you?   You’re big fish, son.  I am _so_ glad I ran into you.”

 _Thank god._   He doesn’t have them.  “I can’t say the same.”

“That hurts my feelings.”  Felix gestures to Washington’s chest.  “ _Shot through the heart!  And you’re to blame!_ ”

Washington glances down at the red dot wobbling over the water streaming down his chestplate and curses.  He steps over a Flood corpse and Felix mirrors him; the laser sighting follows his movements.  _Shit._   Whoever it is has a good position.  “Locus?”

“Why, thirsty for some hatesex?  I’d oblige but I don’t do charity cases anymore.”  Felix circles across from Washington easily, picking his way through the bodies as if they aren’t even there.  “Too much paperwork.”

Locus doesn’t tend to play along with Felix’s games.  If it really was him, Washington would already have a bullet in his skull.  There’s only one sight on him so there _could_ only be one merc, but they’re in an unknown position and Washington can’t rule out the possibility of there being more backup.  It’s a calculated risk but in this rain, Felix’s support might not be willing to try taking him out if he’s too close.

Wash wedges his foot beneath a sopping limb and kicks it in Felix’s direction, lunging after the distraction.  Felix is just as good at close combat as he is, if not better, and Washington barely has enough time to register Felix ducking beneath his rifle burst before his elbow slams into his visor and sends him stumbling back.  In his dizziness Washington hears the crack of a long-range rifle and the sound of the air parting around a bullet whizzing right past his head to bury itself in the bodies behind his shoulder.

“You had a clear shot, you _idiot_!” Felix snarls somewhere to his left. 

His next volley pings off of Felix’s lightshield, though his primed grenade rolls right beneath it and sends Felix sprawling across the rooftop, his shield attachment clattering away.  Washington chases him down and almost takes a knife to the leg when Felix rolls over and swipes at him.  The heel of his palm barely misses Washington’s chin and he stumbles back, trips over a corpse he could’ve _sworn_ wasn’t there before-

Washington rolls, loosing his rifle and emptying almost a clip into the water spray left behind from Felix’s sprint to the edge of the rooftop for his shield augment.  There’s no cover between them, Wash can-

_The sniper._

Washington drops down flat amongst the corpses, heart pounding, but no answering crack of a sniper rifle sounds.  Impossible.  He’d been wide open.  He waits seconds too long, pressed down into the puddles between bodies before pushing himself back up and noticing Felix paused at the edge of the roof with his shield, just as befuddled as he.  “ _Wolkowsky_ ,” Felix snaps.

The bodies at their feet convulse.

Washington scrambles back and away, tripping over a jerking leg and barely catching himself, staring as some of the more whole bodies begin to rise.

“What the fuck,” Felix murmurs from across the spectacle.  Loathe as Wash is to agree with him, he echoes the sentiment.  He notices it then; the holes in the roof around where the bodies are piled the highest squirm with tentacles and, inexplicably, little pink pompoms.  A creature pops out finally, searches out a largely whole body and burrows itself inside the chest; the body jerks and begins to rise.

“Right, that’s my cue to fucking bail.”  Felix spins on his heel to make a quick exit over the edge of the roof only to be slammed back down against it by something black and writhing.  One of the mercs in his standard-issue black armor pounds his fists against Felix’s chestplate and helmet until Felix manages to kick him back and away.

Even from across the roof, Washington can see the tentacles protruding from the visor.

“Mother of _shit!_ ” Felix exclaims, and that’s when the Flood forms from the center of the roof rally and fling themselves at the only two humans left.

 _These are what Tucker and Caboose were up against_ , Washington realizes as a Flood form slams itself into his side and sends him skidding across the roof toward the Pelican.  His shoulder bangs against the outer hull and he stares down the sight of his rifle at the things’ chests, their heads, wherever he can see the little tentacles and pink bits sticking out from the already pockmarked flesh.  As the rifle kicks back against his shoulder he notes with a bittersweet sense of pride that a lot of the bodies are missing limbs from clean, burned cuts that could only be from Tucker’s plasma sword.  _If they went down, it wasn’t without a fight._

In the middle of the chaos Washington hears a wholly unexpected sound: a party horn.  He turns to see a poof of confetti before he’s clobbered in the visor with the butt of an assault rifle.  He almost gets clocked again in the time it takes him to realize that it had been _Freckles_ he’d heard. He grabs the weapon on the downswing and kicks the Flood form back; its arm parts ways with its socket with a sick tearing sound.  Washington shakes its hand loose and snaps Freckles to the small of his back.

Aiming for the tentacle bits works well; forms explode or collapse once their parasite spores are sufficiently dead.  Wash keeps his back against the Pelican to avoid another blindside attack and picks them off as they get too close, the jerk of his rifle comfortingly familiar in his hands.  He sinks into a daze; aim, fire, aim fire, easy to fall into, crowd control, cold, efficient, ruthless.  _A weapon._   When Washington again rises, gets enough breathing room to look around there’s no sign of Felix.  The body of the Flood-infected merc is unmoving at the edge of the roof, head blasted apart. 

The last two forms go down easily, previously crippled by Tucker, and Washington lets the despair run over him again when he realizes that these are what the city of Armonia will have to contend with if he doesn’t detonate that bomb.  That if the spores get into the city, there will be _thousands_ of them.

“Freckles.”  Washington grabs for the assault rifle at his back and searches it over.  Even with how filthy and disgusting the casing is, he can see Caboose’s initials scrawled on the side in permanent marker.  There’s no mistaking the owner.  “Freckles, respond.  What happened?”

The AI gives a grinding whir before falling silent.  Damaged.  Or, perhaps, it doesn’t want to answer.  Caboose would never willingly leave Freckles behind; Washington’s seen him _sleeping_ with the rifle rested gently on the pillow next to his head.  If there’s one material thing Caboose actually takes care of, it’s Freckles.  Wash knows how Caboose feels for his computer friends.

He’d die before abandoning any of them.

_I don’t want to ask you to make that decision._

Washington’s orders are clear, and after that firefight he can see how necessary their caution is. 

He has to deploy the bomb.

Wash stows Freckles and marches stiffly over to the Pelican, drawing out the components for the bomb and assembling it on the rooftop.  Explosive material on the four corners of the roof, run the cables from the detonators to the central console.  Double up on the cables to ensure detonation.  Washington moves by rote; his hands twist cables together and splice them into the console with a sureness he doesn’t feel.  He takes longer than necessary, delaying the inevitable, but when he can no longer put it off he flips open the arming panel.  They hadn’t had sufficient hardware, so a timed countdown was his only option aside from immediate detonation.  Five minutes should be plenty of time for him to get clear of the blast.

All of Chorus, everyone else is in danger of those things until this jungle is no more than a pile of ash.  He has a duty to these people he’s sworn to protect, these people he’s allied himself with by first circumstance, and then convenience until Tucker decided for all of them, _with_ all of them, that they had to stay.  The _sim troopers_ wanted to keep the people of Chorus safe.  They would make the same choice.  Tucker’s come a long way; _he_ would make the same choice.  He has a _duty_ to uphold-

_We are soldiers, Agent Washington.  We follow orders._

He hesitates.

Freckles whirs sadly at his back, clunking painfully back into silence.

Tucker and Caboose aren’t here.  His team isn’t here.  The jungle is crawling with not only Charon’s merciless soldiers, but with a powerful parasitic species that could easily turn them into mindless shambling corpses.  They’ve been out of contact for hours now, their only communication line back home is abandoned and Freckles has been left behind.  All the signs point to their demise.  The odds that they’re still alive are abysmally low.

If Washington detonates the bomb now, he’ll ensure the decimation of the Flood infestation and he might get lucky and take Felix’s squad out, too.  With just Locus to contend with, there’s no way Chorus wouldn’t win.  It would just be a matter of time.  This could be the turning point for Chorus, this could be where they finally ensure their planetary survival. All it would cost is the lives of the two people he holds most dear.

A good soldier would do it.

_Good to have you back, Agent Washington!_

…but Wash hasn’t been a good soldier for a long, long time.

The click of Wash closing the arming panel sounds like a gunshot.  Doyle had been right; Washington _isn’t_ the man for this job.  He doesn’t know if Carolina would be able to flip the switch any more than he can’t, doesn’t know if she’d anticipated this, but it doesn’t matter.  Washington is calling the shots, at least until they send someone after to do what he can’t.  He can’t even muster up the will to be sorry.  He knows he’s putting an entire planet’s population at risk for the sake of just two people, knows it’s selfish and foolhardy and not even a little treasonous.

Well.  It’s not as if he’s never been to jail before.  Assuming he survives.

Washington turns, unslings his rifle and heads for the holes in the center of the roof.  He’ll search the interior of the structure first, then the immediate surrounding area.  He has a lot of ground to cover in not a lot of time; he’ll have to report back to Armonia before they get suspicious, and when he does he wants to give them something good enough to believe in.

 

* * *

 

The rain starts to let up after about an hour of walking, not that it does them any good.

Tucker might’ve finally gotten his desperately-needed drink, but they’re at an impasse.  They don’t know the terrain, the only structure they’re aware of is overrun with fucking _zombie aliens_ and they have no supplies or weapons aside from Tucker’s sword and his battle rifle with its single clip of ammo.

Things have looked worse before.  But not much worse.

“What if we just tried to make friends with them,” Caboose muses aloud, pushing aside a gigantic leaf.

The only upside is that Caboose had finally gotten over whatever funk he’d fallen into, or he was at the very least stowing it for later.  The inane chatter might be annoying and probably not good for concealment, but it’s _normal._   Tucker is used to it, standing around talking.  Or in this case, walking single-file and talking.  Things can’t be that bad if they can still shoot the shit like usual, right?

“I don’t think them killing us is up for negotiation.”

“Maybe we need a translator.”

“Who do you know can speak fucking tentacle-mouth, dude?”

“Probably like, um, an octopus.  Or Cthulhu.” 

Tucker squawks out a laugh.  “How do _you_ know what Cthulhu is?”

“My biggest big sister used to read me bedtime stories.”  Caboose pushes against a branch so hard it snaps.  “Oops.”

“ _Cthulhu_ was your bedtime story?  That explains so much.”  Tucker climbs over a fallen tree.  “Y’know I went to this strip club once.  There was this pole dancer and her stage name was Cthulhu.  I mean, it’s not a great stage name, but I definitely remembered her.  _And_ her routine.  Goddamn!  I didn’t even know legs could bend like that.”

“Tucker?”

“What?”

“Why do people dance with poles?”

God, he’s going to have to give Caboose sex ed right here, in the middle of this jungle hell.  His life really is over.  “Uh, because it’s sexy I guess.”

“Why?”  Caboose uses Tucker’s rifle to lift a leaf this time, very gently.  “It’s like dancing with a stick that doesn’t move.  Wouldn’t it be more fun to dance on the ground?  Or like um, like a trampoline…”

Thank fuck he doesn’t have to explain to him what ‘sexy’ means.  Though a trampoline actually sounds like a good idea.  “Dude, if you don’t get it now then you’re _never_ gonna get it.” 

“Scary Dr. Grey said that people who say that are just not smart enough to know how to explain.”

“What!”  Tucker swats a clump of leaves out of his face.  “Since when do you listen to her?”

“Well, she put Freckles in a gun so I could talk to him, which was really nice.”  Caboose pauses and his voice takes on a distinctly teary quality.  “Ahh, _Freckles…!_   Tucker, it’s been a while, so maybe we could go back and see if Freckles is okay?  And then we can get the bag and the radio?”

“Go back there when we’ve got _fewer_ weapons than before.  Great idea, dumbass.”

Caboose turns around, presumably to complain or whine or say something else idiotic when he pulls up short, staring.  “…huh.”

“What?  What is it?”  Tucker snaps his fingers in front of Caboose’s face when he doesn’t get an answer. 

Caboose points over Tucker’s shoulder.  “Rain man.”

Even for Caboose, it’s nonsensical.  Tucker glances over his shoulder-

-and then he’s on the ground, something _heavy_ crushing into his chestplate, pressing down with enough force to make it creak.  _Fuck, those things caught up, we’re dead_ is what he thinks but there’s nothing above him, no stench, no gurgling shrieks.  He can’t see anything, just drops of rain splashing against-

“ _Locus,_ ” Tucker gasps when the mercenary in question drops his cloaking.  The barrel of the shotgun pointed at his face drips water onto his visor.  Fuck.  _Fuck,_ they were followed, maybe they saw the radio from their camp missing, maybe they found the Pelican, maybe-

 _Caboose._   …is standing right there and not doing anything, of course.  Three mercenaries de-cloak around him weapons up, and he doesn’t even so much as fucking _twitch._   God _damn_ it, of all the times for that moron to space out-

“Who else is with you?” Locus growls.

Tucker grunts when Locus stomps down harder on his chest.  His HUD whines with a pressure alarm.  “Why the fuck should I tell you?  You’re gonna kill me anyway, right?”

Locus pumps his shotgun.  “True enough.”

Caboose _finally_ starts, and lifts a hand to wave at the woods.  “Hello!”

Miraculously, Locus stops.  Likely because he’s astounded by Caboose’s inability to grasp the seriousness of a fucking shotgun in Tucker’s face, something that took Tucker years to overcome after many arduous years of his expectations being lowered time and time again.  If there’s one thing that could bring opposing sides together, it’s their mutual incredulity in the face of Caboose the space case. 

–or it could be shock from seeing a walking brain sack stumble into their small clearing, collapse and explode.

Watching it is worse than knowing about it, and for a few grotesque moments Tucker forgets that he’s about to be murdered by the planet Chorus’s creepiest psycho merc.  Rotting, spongy flesh spatters his armor, Locus’s armor and almost a dozen of the squirming infectious forms from before come flying out, sliding across the jungle floor far too quickly for things without any goddamn legs.

Tucker grabs for the hilt of his sword, ignites it and takes a swipe at Locus.  Locus jumps back but his blade slices right through the stock of his shotgun and gives Tucker the space he needs to roll back up onto his feet.  Something squelches under his boot and he stomps, _hard,_ ignoring the wet popping sound and the stench that wafts up from it.  “ _Caboose!_ ”

He shouldn’t have worried; Caboose trots over, no worse for wear because behind him, the three pirates are screaming and clawing at the backs of their heads where the little infectious forms are piercing, digging, wriggling into their skulls and making their survival suits bulge around the neck as tentacles dig beneath the skin-  “Oh shit, I’m gonna be sick,” Tucker gags, grabbing onto Caboose’s arm and yanking him into a stumbling run with him, slapping his sword hilt back against his leg.

“Our friends came to save us!”

Tucker glances over his shoulder.  No sign of Locus following, but that doesn’t mean shit when the guy can go invisible.  Fucking armor mods.  “They’re not our goddamn friends, Caboose!  What happened to them scaring the daylights out of you?!”

“I wasn’t scared!”

“ _You totally were!_ ”  Tucker wants to follow that argument up with some really good points but that’s about when the world drops from beneath his feet and swallows him whole.  He doesn’t even have time to take a breath to scream before he’s jerked to a halt, dangling in midair with his forearm wrapped up in a vice grip.  Fuck.  _Fuck._   That’s absolutely a bottomless shaft beneath his toes.

 _Enough,_ he thinks, trembling from too many adrenaline rushes in one day.  His tank’s empty.  One more shock is gonna kill him, he just _knows_ it. 

There’s a square of light above him, water dripping down from the edges of the metal hole.  Caboose’s head and shoulders propped up against it- he’d caught Tucker’s arm, that’s the grip around his wrist.  Tucker grabs back on in return, still too shocked to be relieved.  “Th…thanks.”

“Tucker, you are fat,” Caboose grunts as he starts to pull him up.

“I am not, it’s the fucking armor!”  Okay.  Okay, time to be calm now.  He’s not falling to his death, Caboose probably won’t drop him.  Unless he gets distracted, shit.  “Okay, pull me-” Tucker stops short when he sees a flash of tentacles, of pulsating swelling sackbrain behind Caboose’s shoulder- “ _Caboose-!”_

_POP._

Caboose slams into the edge of the shaft from the force of the explosion and tumbles in; Tucker drops into freefall, Caboose falling with him.  He has to stop-  He has to slow them down, he _has to do something_ so he grabs for his sword hilt, ignites it, stabs it into the wall of the shaft and reaches out blindly for Caboose who latches onto his arm again-

The crunch of Tucker’s shoulder being yanked out of his socket almost makes him throw up.  His scream bounces up the edges of the shaft in the silence; rain sliding down the walls hisses when it comes into contact with his half-buried blade, metal melting around the plasma and parting slowly, slowly, sinking them down.  The angle lurches down and Tucker scrabbles to keep the sword jammed into the wall.  “Caboose, grab something,” he manages as his vision swims, as his grip on his sword loosens, as he wonders how, _how_ he’s managed to hold on and not drop like a rock with all five billion pounds of Caboose’s huge body and armor clinging to his dislocated arm.

“Okay!  Okay!”  Caboose does something that makes his arm swing hard and Tucker bites back another scream and tastes blood.  There’s a powerful thud and a shriek of parting metal and then the weight is gone, thank _god,_ but now Tucker’s grip on his sword is loosening in his relief and he thinks he’s going to pass out he’s gonna fall-

“ _Tucker!_ ”

And then he does.


	4. Bad Sandwich

The interior of the temple looks like absolute garbage.

Wash has to go back for one of the grappling hooks in the Pelican when it becomes obvious that he’s going to have to do a lot of climbing. He thinks twice while he’s there, yanks the fuel cells out and affixes them to the small of his back. If anything stumbles onto the Pelican looking for a flight out of there, they’ll be sorely disappointed.

He plucks the detonation key out of the bomb’s control panel too. There was no saying Felix wouldn’t come back, find the bomb and decide to take him out the same way, not that he thinks Felix will be returning any time soon after what they’d just seen. Taking all of them out might be his paycheck, but with no guarantee that his prey will be in the same place Wash doubts Felix would put himself in danger of the Flood.

At least, he hopes so.

His eyes don’t water at the stink of the Flood creatures anymore; he’s long since grown used to the smell, more or less. It’s good, because Tucker hadn’t been kidding when he’d said the inside of the temple stank. Their smell permeates the air, settles alongside the stains on the walls and floor like a tangible thing. Wash finds a few of the infectious forms on his way down and just steps on them, unwilling to waste precious ammunition when they’re so easily disposed of. As long as he doesn’t get overwhelmed and remains diligent, he’s pretty sure he can escape infection.

Then again there’s probably a reason why they’re top secret. Their name is a good indicator of how they secure victory over physically superior forces. “Not all that superior,” Wash murmurs to himself, rolling his shoulder. Those things had punched almost as hard as Maine.

The elevator, like the front entrance, won’t respond to his touch and it looks like the pirates who’d been here before had the same problem. Most likely, it was more nonsense with Tucker’s sword and how it always seemed to turn on ‘old alien shit’ according to him; that means Wash will have to do this the exciting way. Scaling down an elevator shaft with nothing but a standard-issue grappling hook. “Coming back up is gonna be exciting,” Wash sighs, and he doesn’t know why he’s keeping up a running commentary as he affixes the hook to the underside of the elevator. Maybe to keep himself from thinking. Maybe to make it feel like he has company with him. The Reds and Blues always provide a steady stream of nonsense no matter what they do, so actually performing a mission in silence feels unnatural. He actually _misses_ their nonsense banter.

Wash does keep the Blue Team private frequency open though, hoping that the second he comes into range one of them will pick up. Then again, Epsilon had mentioned to him during his last check in that Tucker had been experiencing radio trouble; something about these ruins in particular was screwing with their communications hardware. Not good. The suits usually had decent range, but without an AI to boost and scrub signals they were useless with interference. There’s no way he can make a call back to Armonia without getting back to the Pelican.

Washington sets his mission clock.

Tucker had been right about the hallways. If the aliens were Sangheili, then either they were much smaller thousands of years ago or they enjoyed practically crawling through their own facilities. The tunnels are so low that Washington can easily reach up and touch the ceiling with his entire forearm. Caboose would likely smack his head against the doorjamb. Every doorjamb. Repeatedly.

Thinking about Caboose in here makes Washington’s heart ache, so of course that’s what his mind fixates on. Tucker is a competent soldier, is probably weighing the outcomes and coping as best he can. While he might have a tough time emotionally, Wash can at least count on Tucker pulling through somehow. But Caboose-

Who is he kidding? Caboose is either terrified or having the time of his life. Possibly both simultaneously.

Past the hallways is the larger room Tucker had mentioned in his report; the camp is nestled in the corner, dusty with whatever residue was floating around the air. Washington flips open one of the sleeping rolls with the muzzle of his rifle. Blood.

Well, Epsilon _had_ mentioned the spores loving the taste of human. It wouldn’t be too farfetched to assume that the pirates had been ambushed by the things while asleep. It would explain the hasty abandonment of their camp, why they’d left their radio on with all the frequencies still programmed.

Of course, the similarities between the abandoned merc camp and the LZ aren’t lost on Wash, and he straightens abruptly to continue further inward before he can dwell on that. This is as far as Tucker got into his investigation before everything went south. Maybe there's so little resistance now because Tucker and Caboose cleared things out on the way down? But then where are the bodies?

He can't spend any time thinking about it.

But as Washington descends through the passable levels, as the mission timer counts down he's faced with a dilemma. Does he continue deeper into the structure, or does he return to the surface to check the surrounding jungle? If he goes back up and it turns out they're just deeper inside, then he'll miss them. He's found no clues that they've been in the structure after the attack, and they could be wandering the jungle now.

But at least within the structure, his search is contained. If _he_ starts wandering the jungle, he makes a target of himself to the mercenaries and the Flood. He wouldn't even know where to _begin_ searching if he went topside.

Then something makes a scraping sound further in the hallway and Washington freezes, puts his back to cover and holds his breath. The footsteps- they sound uneven. Wounded? It could be more of the Flood forms. If it was either Tucker or Caboose, undoubtedly he'd have heard some kind of nonsense running commentary by now. Washington peers around his cover. The figure shuffling through the corridors is definitely human-shaped, in armor but it's difficult to tell the color from this dis-

The prickle of danger races down Washington's spine and he turns just in time to catch an armored fist across his visor. Another black-armored mercenary, only half-suited and face slack with rot stands over him, snarling a gurgling warning down at him before taking half a clip to the face. By the time it falls the halls already filled with agonized screams and shrieks, the clamor of clumsily approaching enemies, humanoid.

Washington scrambles up and turns on his heel, backtracking through the hallways to the atrium. He can hear the combatants behind him, the frenetic wet gasps of an animal beyond rational thought and he stumbles back onto the light bridge, bringing his rifle up to bear in time for a humanoid Flood form to burst from the hallway. Its skull chips away and still it comes and Washington curses, reloads; four more Flood forms pour from the doorway.

The door behind him on the other side of the bridge drones a soft tone before sliding open to allow more of the Sangheili Flood forms entry. “Freckles,” Washington shouts over the cacophony of gunfire and the Flood's screams, “can you still fire? Are you still operational?”

Freckles gives a grinding whine that Washington takes as a yes. He snaps the rifle from his back, lets the AI handle the auto-targeting on the west side of the room and keeps his attention on the east, abandoning the scope of his battle rifle in favor of upping the fire rate as much as possible. The answering kick of assault rifle fire against his left hand is a blessing and he can feel the small jerks of aim adjustment yanking his hand this way and that.

Once the east hallway is clear Washington returns his full attention to the west in time to see Freckles cutting down the last two combatants. The silence that rings afterwards feels false and that prickle hasn't faded, so Washington wrenches around to face east-

_POP._

The force of the explosion staggers Washington; his foot slips on the slick edge of the light bridge and he falls, clipping a supply crate on the way down and landing with a truly alarming clatter. Freckles buzzes anxiously in his hands as he rolls over, tries to breathe through the stabbing pain of a hard landing, turns and sees- the spore forms, lifts Freckles to tear into their spongey flesh with a few potshots-

But he's out, he's out of ammo and Wash didn't bring assault rifle ammo with him, he scrambles for his battle rifle, crushes one of the things in his fist-

Something slaps onto his shoulders and all Wash can do is hold back a scream when he feels the sharp points of a tentacle stab through the thick Kevlar of his survival suit.

 

* * *

 

No one moves to break the silence.

Breaking the silence means admitting several things: it means that Washington is hours late to his check-in. It means that they’ve now lost two ships, two parties to the jungle where an infectious species known for destroying planets currently resides. It means one of the best soldiers on Chorus has either been captured, killed…or has abandoned the rest of Chorus in favor of trying to save his companions.

Carolina doesn’t want to be the first to speak, but she does. “This doesn’t automatically mean the worst.”

“Agent Washington is two hours late to check in, Carolina,” Kimball murmurs, arms folded over her chestpiece as she stares at the holographic table.

“Washington is late to a lot of shit,” Epsilon supplies a little too quickly. “Trust me, I’d know.”

The silence settles again, fragile like fresh snowfall.

“I think our course of action is clear,” Doyle finally says, voice laden with regret. Carolina knows that out of the two generals Doyle knows Washington the best; it must hurt that he’s right. “We must send another ship.”

Kimball squeezes her arms and says nothing.

“We will give the pilot instructions to attempt contact, but if they are unsuccessful…we _must_ instruct the pilot to bomb the area and leave nothing left.”

Church’s avatar flares a bright white. “Hold on a minute-”

“Doyle, we should still wait,” Kimball interjects lowly.

“Wait for _what?_ ” Doyle sweeps his hand out to gesture to the data still on display on the table. “Ms. Kimball, this threat has taken three of our best men. You’ll allow it to take more?”

“I’m not _allowing_ anything,” Kimball argues hotly.

“Wash _is_ late,” Carolina interjects, “but that doesn’t mean he’s unsuccessful. What’s likely happened is that he found clues to their survival and is trying to investigate.”

“Then why hasn’t he sent back word of his investigation?”

Church’s avatar flickers again. “Look, there was a shitton of interference when Tucker rang, maybe he’s having trouble reaching-”

“Even if Agent Washington was unable contact the capital from the ruins, if he’s found them and armed the bomb, he’ll already be making his return upon the third ship’s arrival.” Doyle turns to address Kimball directly. “Ms. Kimball, I know I’m not alone when I say that the only thing you and I can agree on is how much Agent Washington and the Captains mean to Chorus. But we _cannot_ continue like this.”

Kimball stares into the cycloptic eye of Doyle’s helmet, shifting her weight back onto her hip, forward onto her leg and back as she thinks. “…we’ll give it two more hours.”

Epsilon flickers again. “Two hours isn’t-”

“We can’t continue to delay the inevitable! This is an enemy who has consumed entire worlds within days! We _must_ neutralize this threat as soon as possible!”

“ _Two hours_ won’t destroy the planet, Doyle!” Kimball waves her hand. “Any enemy combatants would still need to leave the jungle and cross hundreds of miles of rugged terrain before they even get near the capital. I agree that we can’t wait forever, but any escapees will easily be spotted by air and dealt with then. We can do a sweep-”

“Would you both _listen_ to-”

“We can’t spare the manpower to perform a sweep! We still have other operations, and with each one our destruction hangs in the balance! We cannot continue to pour our resources into this one when we already _know_ the outcome!”

Kimball snarls. “You’re talking about them like they’re already dead.”

“They may very well be!”

_Don’t say that._

Carolina starts and stares at Church’s avatar, glitching and breaking apart, knitting itself together again. The display with the Flood information fritzes before blinking out all together and she snaps to attention, closing the distance between she and the data pedestal in a few brisk steps, “Church, we’re leaving. Transfer to storage.”

“You’re not sending another ship.” Church’s voice grates out through the room’s sound system instead of the table’s, low and too loud and rough with interference. The display flickers purple and red and the generals suddenly snap out of their argument, staring at the little avatar standing with his head bowed and his fists clenched. “If you think for one goddamn minute-”

“Epsilon,” Carolina insists, hand on his storage chip in the pedestal, “ _prep for transfer_ -“

“-that I’m gonna let you drop a _fucking bomb_ on them when we haven’t even heard back-”

“Agent Carolina, _control your AI,_ ” Kimball insists, a hand flying reflexively to her sidearm.

A high-pitched screech fills the room; the feedback screams through her helmet’s speakers and Carolina jerks back, hands clamping over the sides of her head reflexively. Whispers like _Allison, I’m sorry honey, we’re not supposed to be here,_ _ **Allison**_ fill her head and through the haze of a sudden stab of pain she can see Kimball and Doyle wrenching at their helmets, trying to cover the external mics. All the lights snap out save for Church’s display; his avatar vanishes in favor of data streams, pulsing red and angry like a vein about to burst.

“ _ **I’LL TEAR THIS CITY APART FIRST.”**_

_That is_ _**not** _ _Church’s voice._

Carolina snaps forward and yanks his storage chip from the pedestal. The hologram vanishes, throws the room into darkness; the silence in the wake of Epsilon’s scream rings.

Kimball and Doyle are staring at her. She doesn’t dare slot the chip into her armor just yet. She’ll have to soon; she’d pulled him before he was ready, he could be corrupted, but not while they’re watching. No, with them staring, she- “I’m sorry,” Carolina gasps, still feeling uneven, still feeling the floor bucking beneath her feet as she leans against the pedestal. The metal plates look like the training room tiles for a few seconds between the minutes. _Get yourself together, Carolina._

Kimball sounds as rattled as Carolina feels. “Carolina, what the _hell-_ ”

“It’s not his fault.” It’s out before she can stop herself. Making excuses for him after a display like that won’t do them any favors but she- It wouldn’t be fair, it wouldn’t be _right_ of them to think of him as insane or dangerous when they don’t know the whole picture. “It’s not his fault. The files from the UNSC overloaded him, he’s been working overtime and it’s put too much strain on him. He- the Project was the least kind to their AI. He doesn’t deal well with losing people.”

Doyle, at least, doesn’t sound ready to demand Epsilon’s deletion. “Agent Carolina, you speak of him as if he were a human being.”

“He’s at least part of one,” Carolina insists. She clutches the chip firmly in her hand, presses her fist to her leg. They can’t actually force her to hand Church over, but things will get complicated if they try. “I’ll keep him out of the servers. Disable the signal hardware in my suit until I’m sure he’s harmless. You have my word.”

“You _can’t_ be thinking of putting him back into your head after that.”

Carolina shakes her head at Doyle, at herself, because that’s absolutely her plan. She can’t deny it, it would be stupid but she owes him some faith, maybe. “I’ll have to eventually.”

“…fine. I’d argue, but I doubt you’ll listen. Neither of us can tell you what you do with your own equipment.” Kimball glances over at Doyle, who nods. “But keep him _away_ from our systems. I don’t want him anywhere near any of our servers until he’s checked out by Dr. Grey- in fact, get Captain Simmons to examine him too, isolated hardware only. And tell them both I need them to check for anything he might’ve destroyed while he was in here.”

It’s more generous than what she’d expected, anyway. “And Wash?”

Kimball fixes Doyle with a look.

Doyle shifts uneasily before sighing. “Against my better judgment…I will defer to Ms. Kimball. This time. Two hours.”

 

* * *

 

Tucker lands on a downfeather mattress.

At least, that’s what it feels like. It’s hard to tell around the blinding agony of his dislocated shoulder (and his suit’s biofeed is _not_ happy about that) but eventually he gets his breath back and eventually his vision stops swimming and _eventually_ he can start making out shapes, least of which is the square of light from the shaft opening and Caboose probably no more than ten feet above him, one arm and a foot buried into the metal of the shaft like he’d just punched right into it.

He can handle this. The pain’s nothing compared to some of the other shit he’s been through. Blown up by a rocket, mowed down by a tank, gave birth to an alien baby (okay so it was a c-section but the labor had been in _tense_ ), so a dislocated shoulder? Pfft. Whatever. _Whatever._ Something like this isn’t even worth writing up an injury report. He can just push himself up here- nope no okay it still hurts like a mother _fucker_ -

“Ah, Tucker? Are you alive?”

As Tucker clutches at his shoulder, employing breathing exercises to keep himself from passing out he realizes that he’d caught Caboose for nothing. He dislocated his shoulder and almost killed himself _for nothing._ Caboose would’ve been fine; Tucker’s not sure but the shaft doesn’t look as long as the cliff was high so the fall was absolutely survivable. Especially when landing on something so soft- What _is_ he on?

“Tucker?” Ah shit, Caboose sounds nervous.

“F-fine,” Tucker calls up to him, even though he’s shaking and his extremities are starting to feel kinda cold. Shock. Ah yes, shock. His old friend. “I’m fine. It’s okay Caboose, you can just- You can drop down.”

“What? That can’t be right. Are you sure you’re okay?”

Indignation flares. He dislocated his fucking shoulder for this. “Yes, asshole, I’m fine! Get down already!”

“Okay, okay…”

Tucker at least has the presence of mind to get out of the way before Caboose flattens him. Once off the cushion he can see what it is; jungle debris. Decades of the shaft being open had shuffled dirt and leaves down the hole, and the rain had helped decompose it. The entire bottom of the shaft is filled with natural compost, almost pitch-black and easily mistaken for, a bottomless pit, if one is inclined to be dramatic. Or has picked up such a trait from certain Blue Team Leaders over the years.

Shock does that to a person though, makes everything dramatic and Tucker can feel his teeth chattering as he clutches at his arm to his side. …he’s going to have to ask Caboose for help. God. Okay, he’s either going to have a fixed arm or a ripped off stump, it’s kind of a coin toss at this point. “C-Caboose, get…get over here.”

Caboose rolls off of the compost happily like he’s bouncing around in a ball pit and approaches Tucker. “That was really exciting. What’re we doing now?”

 _Exciting._ Tucker has never before wished he could be Caboose, but right about now sounds like it would be nice. “I need-” _Don’t say help._ “-I need you to do something. My arm’s dislocated, I gotta get it popped back in.” He grimaces at the feel of the suit and armor pressing against the bone the wrong way. It just needs to be back in the socket; he can lock the suit down around it after and that’ll hold it in place but he has to get this taken care of _now._

“Yeah…okay…” Caboose shifts his weight. “I don’t really know how to do that.”

“ _I know that_ , just.” Tucker grabs Caboose’s wrist and lifts his arm, positions his hand outward. “Look. Just stay right there, and don’t move an _inch_ okay? Don’t move at all.” Tucker braces his shoulder against Caboose’s palm and-

“Oh my god a cave!”

“Caboose! _Fuck!_ ” Tucker leans against the wall as Caboose trots down what appears to be a maintenance hallway shooting off from the shaft. Or it could be Tucker’s rapidly tunneling vision, because the moron had fucking _moved when Tucker told him not to_ and Tucker smacked his shoulder into the wall when he’d tried to pop it back in. Breathe. Stay conscious.

Breathe in.

-oh god no, god _no_ it's that smell, _again._ The entire jungle from the roots up must be stuffed full of those _things_ _-_

“Tucker, come here! Bring your key sword! It’s really dark.”

Tucker hasn’t had any food since before they left Armonia; barely any water since then too. His head aches, the knot on his skull throbs. His limbs are dull and dead with exhaustion. His arm pulses with agony, suit and armor fitting wrong and pressing against it in all the worst ways. Somewhere above them are a hundred fucking monsters waiting to crawl into their brainpans and make themselves at home if Locus doesn’t put a bullet through their skulls first, and now this trap they’ve just fallen into is stuffed full of _even fucking more_ of the same brain-hijacking things. And even if, even _if_ they can make it through all of that, there’s still Wash on his way to an empty LZ that looks like their graves with a gigantic bomb and orders to probably deploy it if they can’t be found. Which of course they can’t be, because they’re in a _hole_ in the _jungle_ the middle of _fucking nowhere._

And Caboose wants to go _explore._

“Tuckerrrr.” The exasperated tone to Caboose’s voice snaps something fragile. Tucker wants to rip his throat out. “What is taking so long? Gah- now I can’t find my way ba- oh there you are.” He’ll kill him. “Tucker, are you sleeping? WAKE UP TUCKER, THIS IS NO TIME TO NAP.” _He’ll kill him._

Caboose’s hand lights on Tucker’s arm and Tucker slaps it away. Stares, trembling, until he shoves Caboose with his good arm as hard as he can. Caboose has to be startled because there’s no way otherwise that he’d stumble back, trip and fall onto the compost; a dark, hurt, angry part of Tucker wishes he’d just let Caboose fall, because maybe at least the shock of the landing would’ve knocked him out so he’d _shut the fuck up already._ “What is _wrong_ with you?” Tucker shouts, not liking how strung up and shaky his voice sounds but unable to strengthen it. “What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?!”

_You just keep yourself and Caboose alive, that is your one and only objective._

“Do you not get it?! Are you so fucking _stupid_ that you don’t get it? We’re gonna die! Everything in this jungle is trying to kill us including our _own pickup_ and you want to go spelunking in a fucking air duct like fucking Indiana Jones! Of all the people I had to get stuck out here with, of course it _had_ to be you! I might as well just kill myself _now_ and save you and everything else in this deathtrap the _god damn trouble!_ ”

Caboose stares up at him from the compost pile, utterly still.

Tucker’s chestplate heaves as he breathes hard, as he clenches and unclenches his fist, tries to keep his knees from unlocking but he's fighting a losing battle there. He backs up against the wall and slides down it, armor scraping over the metal. His arm folds into his lap and it _hurts_ god damn it, it hurts but not as much as the crushing realization that they're probably not getting back home.

They're not going to make it.

They're going to die out here, infected or shot or blown up and it's because Tucker can't even manage to hold a single fucking LZ for a handful of hours, can't manage to get a stupid Pelican up in the air, can't even tell when a fully armored murderer is two steps behind him until _Caboose_ spots him. _Caboose_ noticed something following them to the ship, _Caboose_ wanted to go back to the LZ and stick it out and all Tucker could think about each time they ran was how he's really only adept at getting himself and other people wounded and killed and how he can't be responsible for doing that again.

But here they are anyway, trapped in a ventilation shaft, Tucker with a dislocated shoulder and a concussion and Caboose becoming less and less capable of grasping the gravity of the situation because his medicine is wearing off and Tucker didn't have the goddamn foresight to pack more. They aren’t where they are now because Caboose has been fucking up. They’re there because he’s not half the soldier Washington believes he can be, and he’s known it from the start. They’re both gonna die, and it’s the direct result of his own chain of poor decisions.

 _His_ screwups. _His_ failures.

Tucker ducks his head, pulling up his knees and trying not to shake since it jostles his shoulder but he's cold, it's fucking cold and he wants to sleep already, wants to close his eyes and stop being here. His fingers find the tattered edge of Junior's photograph in his ammo pouch and he withdraws it, presses it to his visor as he screws his eyes shut. His breath shudders hard in his chest and makes his shoulder twinge.

There's a shift of armor next to him and Tucker jerks his head up, staring.

Caboose is pulling himself up from the compost pile and kneeling next to Tucker.

With mechanical precision he puts his hand up palm-out, the heel of his glove nearly touching Tucker’s shoulder. He won’t look Tucker in the face, but he’s _there_ and he’s unmoving and he’s willing to-

_You just have to try._

Shame boils sick in Tucker’s gut. Caboose still won’t look at him.

“Caboose,” he tries, but falters. There’s nothing he can say. “You could make it out of here without me,” Tucker says instead, but he doesn't believe it. Caboose is too unaware. He'd waltz right up to a Flood form and try to make friends within an hour.

“You would make a bad sandwich,” Caboose mutters down to Tucker’s knees, like that's supposed to _mean_ something to him. Caboose's hand is still there, unwavering and unmoving so Tucker tucks the photo of Junior back into his armor and shuffles closer. He adjusts his arm with a muted hiss of pain, positions his shoulder against Caboose's hand and _-_

When he comes back to he doesn't even remember what he did. His arm is throbbing in time with his head and his pulse and is cradled, again, on his lap. He can feel it, can move it but it burns like fire so it’s staying right there where it is. Caboose is crouched over him, battle rifle tight in his grip and he seems to be standing guard, actually. Or making the attempt.

“Thanks,” Tucker mutters. He manually locks down the armor around his arm to hold it in place and grips Caboose’s shoulder armor to try and pull himself up.

Caboose’s hand pressing against his chest keeps him against the wall. “Tucker,” Caboose starts, “you are being very stupid right now.”

Tucker sighs. “Yeah, I know.”

“ _Very_ stupid.”

“I know.”

Caboose drops his hand. “You are always more stupid when you don’t know what to do. Sometimes it happens.” He glances back up the shaft; the light reflects off of his visor. “And you say mean things when you’re stupid. But that sometimes happens too, so I forgive you.”

Tucker’s face burns. He’s glad for his helmet hiding his expression. “…thanks.”

Caboose nods, like that’s that, and pushes himself up. “It’s still raining so we should go inside the house. And you need your key.”

Tucker uses the wall to push himself up. His knees, at least, feel a little steadier. He must have been out for a little while; the light streaming into the shaft is falling at a sharper angle than before. “Caboose, we don’t even know if this leads anywhere.”

“It does.” Caboose shrugs easily. “That’s what hallways do.”

He has a point. And if Caboose three hours off his meds has a point over Tucker, he knows he’s _really_ fucked up. “Why are you being so nice to me?” Tucker asks, trying not to sound suspicious and likely failing. “I was huge dick just now.”

Caboose tilts his head, puzzled. “I thought I said-”

“You hate me,” Tucker insists, and he doesn’t know why this is so important, why _now._ Why, when time is of the essence, when he’s exhausted and hungry and thirsty and in pain, why this fucking matters at all. Maybe it’s because of all of that. Maybe because if they really do kick it here, he wants to know this one thing. Why, when Caboose has hated his guts from day one, he’s bothering to do anything nice at all for Tucker. Why he caught his hand, why he’d stuck close and listened to what Tucker had to say, why he’d sat with Tucker after Felix had stabbed him.

Caboose had been there in his hospital room, fiddling quietly with a pile of old electronics, like he’d been there for days. He’d been the first thing Tucker saw when he woke up, but he’d never asked _why._

“Tucker,” Caboose insists, folding his arms and shifting his weight, looking away, “We’re _friends._ ”

…oh.

Well.

That explains a lot.

Caboose shuffles his feet when Tucker doesn’t say anything before he spins suddenly, throwing his hands into the air. “ _Okay_ we are going to go into the scary hallway now because I am embarrassed! Now we are leaving now, let’s go.”

Tucker blames every stupid warm feeling he’s having on the shock as he follows Caboose into the dark, fumbles for the sword hilt at his side and watches the little lights of Caboose’s armor travel in front of him, his teammate’s broad back a steady, solid, ever-present fixture.

 

* * *

 

_-cus- -opy me al- -cking-_

Locus’s hand snaps automatically to the signal receiver of his helmet, pressing down. “Felix. Respond.”

_-hrist! I’ve been trying to call you forever! What the fuck is up with these goddamn radios, this is supposed to be top-of-the-line-_

Of course Felix would finally make contact only to waste their time _complaining._ “Felix,” Locus growls, “stow it. We have a situation.”

_You’re te—ing me! This place is fucking monster central. Wolkowsky got his face eaten by some fetish porn._

Locus frowns. “I sent Ramirez with you, not Wolkowsky.”

 _Whoever the fuck it was, I don’t care. The point is that there’s some shit in this that we’re_ _ **not**_ _getting the proper bonuses for._ Years of working alongside Felix clues Locus in to the note of unease in his voice. _Speaking of bonuses, I ran into your boytoy. He’s looking for the sim troopers too, but_ _ **apparently**_ _they stood him up._

“I found them.”

_What?! Fuck!_

Locus will give Felix time to simmer before he brings up the ‘contest’ he’d pitched. He doesn’t like to play into Felix’s childish games, but if that means he can collect on some weaponry (or maybe a signed contract that Felix will keep his mouth shut for a week) then he might lower himself to it for once. “They escaped.”

_Hahahaaa, doesn’t count if they get away._

“We were attacked by these…creatures. They killed the rest of our men.” Even with all the horrors they’d seen during the Great War, watching the monsters slither into the skulls of his subordinates was enough to make Locus’s stomach turn. Putting them out of their misery had been just as much mercy as prudence.

 _Ran in- -ose too. Big nasty fuc--rs, -ooked like -ead Sang--li_ -

“What?” Locus presses his hand harder against the side of his helmet. “Felix, repeat. The lifeforms I encountered were small.”

_The fuck? No, these things were- well I guess there w-- little ones, but the -ings that attacked me were definitely like, fucking zombies or s-me shit. They hit like a train, too._

This complicates matters.

The introduction of Agent Washington into the mix aside (which in and of itself is cause for reevaluation), unknown combatants are reason enough to interrupt the mission and report in. “We need to consult with Control before proceeding any further.”

_Oh by all means! We can b-rely reach each other, but let’s fucking place a call to_ _**space** _ _._

It’s awful that he has a point. “Then let’s rendezvous back at the transport-”

Felix lets out a frustrated snarl. _We’re going to fucking_ _ **lose them**_ _if we go all th- way back to base to call Cont—l! We should hunt them down now, while we have them split up._

“You are allowing your petty vendetta with Lavernius Tucker to cloud your judgment,” Locus reminds him, like he expects it to have any impact.

_It’s more than that and you know it._ _**You’re** _ _the one who k-- saying they’re dangerous. This is a prime opp—nity to rem-ve them from the equation._

They work well together, and this is one of the reasons why. Felix is reckless, foolhardy and overconfident, but he takes initiative. Too much initiative, in Locus’s opinion, but it _is_ occasionally a necessary trait, especially for gentlemen in their line of work. While taking such drastic action without consulting Control first sits wrong with him for a multitude of reasons (the foremost being the creatures and the danger they pose to their operation), Locus has to admit that the situation _is_ advantageous to removing several key problematic members of the resistance on Chorus. Losing the Blues will not only demoralize the armies of Chorus, but with Washington out of the picture that leaves only one Freelancer to contend with. One Freelancer that Locus is sure he and Felix can overpower together.

“All right,” he agrees lowly. “Follow Agent Washington. If he reunites with the sim troopers, they’ll become much more difficult to handle. I’ll follow the troopers and dispose of them.”

_This does_ _**not** _ _count t-ward the contest._

“Forget the contest,” Locus snaps. “This is the job. We do this quickly and efficiently; no showboating, no stalling. I don’t want to be here any longer than we have to with those creatures loose.”

_You scared?_

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

_Well they’re gross, so I don’t blame you._

“I am _not_ scared.”

_You are._

“I’m not.”

_A little bit._

“No.”

 

* * *

 

There’s a beat of pure shock where Washington can’t move, can’t breathe, just realizes _this is it_ and then the beat stretches beyond a believable amount of time. He snaps his hand back, grabs the tentacle and rips it away from him, throws the Flood spore across the room and pumps it full of probably way more rounds than necessary.

The echo of his gunfire hangs in the air like a pall as Washington tries to convince himself that the danger is momentarily over, that he can lower his weapon. It takes too long a time. His fingers clench tight around the stock of his rifle; he checks each cardinal direction. Waits for something else to happen, waits to realize that he’s either safe or dead.

When two long minutes creep by with nothing but Wash’s harsh breathing to keep him company, he forces his rifle back down and feels the back of his neck. Okay. Survival suit is definitely pierced; won’t survive hostile environments, not that the void of space is an immediate issue. What stopped the spore then? Was it damaged when it tried to cut through his suit, or-

Wash’s finger traces over something hard and it hits him. _His implants._ The spore had stabbed directly into the metal slot of his implants. One millimeter lower and it would’ve had a highway directly into his brain stem but because its proboscis had hit the metal casing and delicate cabling underneath instead of flesh, it had paused in confusion and given him enough time to shake it off.

Those damn implants just saved his life.

Adrenaline seeps out of Wash’s limbs and makes them feel weak; he shakes them out, flexes his fingers before allowing himself to lean against a nearby wall, head tilting back. For years he’s hated the things, wished there was a way to just yank them out without risking serious brain damage and now, they just saved him from what would probably have been a horrifying and agonizing death.

Funny how things work out like that.

The mission clock tics down in the corner of Washington's HUD.

It's time to make a decision.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everybody who guesses which section of this chapter i had the hardest time with gets a drabble with a prompt of their choice


	5. George Romero Extra

“That,” Caboose says solemnly, “is a lot of guns.”

“For once we agree on something.” 

The hallway they’d been in before was definitely a ventilation shaft.  It ended in a sort of grate-looking thing that Caboose had to kick out before he and Tucker could squeeze through the hole and drop into a hallway that strongly resembled the ruins they’d seen before.  The hallway and connecting twists and turns were only dimly lit by running lights.  At one point one of the hallways had opened into a yawning underground cavern with an _actual_ bottomless pit and the start of a bridge, but even Tucker’s sword hadn’t turned the damn thing on and they’d had to backtrack.  The hallways twisted and rose up and sloped down so often that Tucker was pretty sure they would never be able to find their way back to the shaft.

But then they came across this.  Tucker doesn’t even need his sword, the room glows so brightly.  Rows upon rows of alien weaponry line the wall, occupy dozens of those purple Sangheili weapons lockers, lie scattered atop tables or piled up into the corners of the room.  Crates of ammunition sit wedged between weapons lockers glowing purple, green, a pulsing blue.  They _look_ operational and they look valuable as fuck, but it’s not like- “Caboose don’t you dare!  Get back up here!”

Caboose is already sliding off the upper walkway and jogging over to the nearest locker, plucking a plasma rifle from it.  “This does _not_ look like a baby at _all,_ ” he muses.  “Felix must have bad eyesight.”

“ _Caboose._   Put it down.”  Tucker sits down to throw his legs over the edge of the walkway, ready to drop when Caboose looks down the _goddamn barrel of the thing_ and starts fumbling around with the trigger.  “ _Caboose_ you’re going to blow your fucking head off!”

“It doesn’t work,” Caboose calls back up to Tucker after pulling the trigger no less than nine times.

“Yeah, I got that!  Jesus Christ.”  Well, it makes sense, all of the other weapons don’t work.  “Put it down and get back up here.  We gotta keep moving.”

“Tucker I’m _tired,_ ” Caboose complains, tossing the rifle aside and reluctantly ambling back over toward the bridge.  He gets distracted by the crate of purple ammunition along the way, picking up a couple of the rocklike clips.

“So am I, and I’m the one with the busted arm.  Quit your bitching.”  Tucker is really, really starting to appreciate all the hell Wash went through trying to get them to behave at the crash site.  Sure, all that training had been a severe pain in the ass, but just being responsible for Caboose for more than half a day is hell.  He doesn’t even want to imagine the hassle it must’ve been to get _both_ their asses in gear every single day.

The next room holds a little more promise than the last one, at least.  “Is that a vid screen?  I think that’s a screen.  I think this is a radio!  Holy shit, come on badass super awesome sword-”

“-key.”

“ _Sword._ ”  Tucker glares at Caboose before igniting his sword.  The screen flares to life, pale blue and pulsing, and a pedestal on the console before them lights up a slot.  “I guess I gotta stick it in.  _Bow ch-”_

“ _Hey chika bump bump_.”

“Caboose, don’t take my punchline!”

“Sorry, sorry.”

Tucker sends him one final glare before finagling the plasma blade into the slot.  The console dings with a pleasant tone before flashing a bunch of nonsense characters at their face.  Tucker can’t really read Sangheili aside from the few pickup lines and curse words Church showed him, but he knows what a ‘data corrupted’ error message looks like.  “Fuck!  I dunno if we can use this.”

“Aww, little fella probably just needs someone to talk to.”  Caboose presses his hands against the console surface.  “Are you a sad, broken TV?  You poor sad TV.  All you want to do is show people some infomercials, and that is not a crime.  I love infomercials.  They are _informative_.”

“Dear god.”  Tucker rolls his eyes and turns away, tapping his sword hilt against his thigh.  There _has_ to be something in the room they can use.  It’s not large, but it looks like it was once a lab.  There’s a tall half-busted glass observation chamber in the center of the room, stretching from the ground to the ceiling and encircled by catwalks on the second floor.  Scattered about are various supply crates and tables, more of that sick yellowish goo with green and brown chunks mottled within it.  The Flood must’ve set up camp in here at one point, or-

“Oh!  Yes, it is TV time.”

Tucker whirls around.  “What- Caboose!  How’d you do that?”

“Tucker shush,” Caboose hisses, holding up a finger.  “The movie is starting.”

It definitely is.  Sangheili in weird old-ass armor keep talking to the camera and gesturing to shit and Tucker’s only picking up about one in every six words.  It’s pretty clear that the console isn’t a radio though, which was all he’d wanted the damn thing for.  “God damn it.  Okay, we’re wasting time, let’s get going.”

Caboose doesn’t budge.  “I wanna watch the movie.”

“You realize we’re on the clock here, right?  To avoid _death._   We don’t have time to watch a fucking movie.”

“It’s very artistically done,” Caboose insists a little louder.  Tucker shushes him.  “I want to watch the movie, Tucker!” Caboose whisper-yells furiously.  “It’s about this room!”

“I don’t- wait, is it?”  Tucker squints up at the screen.  That does look like the glass observation chamber in the background, but what’s moving around inside of-

_Flood spores._

A chill trips down Tucker’s spine as he shuffles closer, listening.  He knows that word, _Creators,_ that’s one that gets thrown around a lot in regards to religious crap the Forerunners left behind.  Something something Creators, the Sangheili talking gestures back to the chamber.  Is it a military log?  A scientific log?  Maybe there’s something about how to kill all the Flood at once, some kind of gigantic fuck-you weapon.

“What’re they saying?” Caboose asks at Tucker’s shoulder.

“Shut up,” Tucker tells him absently.  Shit, he should’ve paid closer attention to his Sangheili crash course before he got reassigned.  Creators, Creators Creators they keep saying that word and-

Weapon?  “Are these things a weapon?” Tucker asks incredulously.  “Did the Forerunners _make_ the fucking Flood?”

The Sangheili on the video, Tucker and Caboose all jump at the same time at the sound of shattering glass and Tucker watches, with a detached sort of horror, as Flood spores pour out from the observation chamber on the screen and begin to overrun the Sangheili.  The little things go down easily as ever but there are so many, _so many_ and they roll over the Sangheili one by one, crashing over them in little waves, squirming and the screaming starts, the roaring like animals in agony as the things stab into their necks, force themselves into their mouths and tear open the backs of their throats to get into their skulls, as they slither up into their brains-

Tucker slams a hand against the console and the screen goes black.

The quiet of the room feels dangerous, like a sniper holding his breath to line up the shot.  Tucker stares at the broken observation chamber, at the stains on the walls and floor.  He notices belatedly that Caboose has crowded closer to him, nearly clinging to his arm and he, like Tucker, hasn’t said a word.

“That’s why there’s a bunch of weapons and empty temples and infected Sangheili all over this place,” Tucker finally whispers into the silence.  “The Sangheili didn’t abandon this planet.  They were gonna kill the Flood but they all got infected.”

Caboose murmurs, “And that is why you are supposed to get your flu shot.”

Tucker curls his hand into a fist.  “…we gotta blow this place up.”

“Oh I like that plan,” Caboose agrees happily.  “Yup, that’s a good plan.”

“Caboose,” Tucker says, turning on him.  “If we blow this place up with us still in it, we’re probably gonna die.  You get that, right?”

Caboose tilts his head.  “We almost die lots of times.  Is this different?”

Tucker’s hand rests over where the scar from Felix’s knife sits on his gut, a flesh-pink line that wouldn’t darken no matter how Dr. Grey treated it.  “I guess it’s not.”

Caboose nods.  “Then we’ll just not die again this time.”

Right.  “Good plan.  I agree with that plan too.”

“Okay.  So then you do the blowing up planning and I will do the staying alive planning.  We will be teammates.”

Tucker sighs.  “We’re _already_ teammates, Caboose.”

“Yes but now we are _planning_ teammates.”

A familiar gurgle interrupts Tucker’s thought processes and he moves on instinct, grabbing Caboose’s shoulder and pulling him over to hide behind the crates, shoving him down.

The shuffling footsteps of Flood forms echo against the high ceiling of the room and Tucker pokes his head around the edge of the crate.  The forms that are ambling across the room are definitely _not_ Sangheili; amongst all the rot and slime, Tucker thinks he can see black armor.  Well, that solves the mystery of the empty pirate camp.

The Flood loiter about in the room and Tucker grimaces, resting his hand on his sword.  He’ll have to get rid of them, but what if they draw more?  What if he can’t cut them down as easily because of the armor?

He’s debating the best way to take them out (maybe sending Caboose to go play decoy while he sneaks up from behind) when suddenly their heads snap to stare in the same direction before they take off at a snarling scramble, shoving themselves through the hallway door at the far end of the room.  “What the fuck,” Tucker asks once they’ve gone, popping out of their cover.  “What the fuck was _that?_ ”

Caboose rises beside him.  “Maybe they were late for an appointment?”

“Come on.”  Tucker starts for the far door only to jerk to a halt when Caboose’s hand closes around his wrist.  “What?  Caboose, come on!  Either they ran that way because that’s the way _out_ of here or they ran that way because they’re going after somebody.  Either way, that’s the direction we need to head in.”

Caboose doesn’t look convinced, shifting his weight nervously.  “I don’t like those guys.  What if they come back?”

“Then you get behind me and I kill them in the face with my badass sword skills.  We’ve got no idea where we’re going; if we don’t follow them, we’ll be stuck down here forever, so c’mon let’s _go._ ”  When Caboose still doesn’t budge or let go, Tucker sighs.  He points two fingers at his own visor.  “You’re still with me, right?”

“Yeah,” Caboose mumbles.

“Well, I’ve got a plan.  This is my plan: we follow those freaks and see what’s up.  If it’s a way out then yay, fresh air.  If it’s another merc then yay, we get to watch them get eaten.  And if it’s Wash then he might need our help and we’re gonna go save him.  If they come after us, I’ll just go swish swish stab and they’re done.  Okay?  That’s my whole plan.  Does that sound like a good plan?”

Caboose shifts his weight again.

“Let’s try this instead.  Do you trust me?”  At Caboose’s hesitant nod, Tucker claps a hand to his shoulder.  “Then you stay behind me.  I’ll take care of everything.”

“But your arm hurts.”

“I’m just hamming it up so people feel bad for me.”

“You do that sometimes,” Caboose agrees.

“You’re damn right I do.”  This time when Tucker starts for the hallway, Caboose lets him go.  He follows close, just a few steps behind before latching onto the fusion pack of his armor and Tucker won’t admit it aloud, but after everything they’ve been through together he just doesn’t have the heart to make him let go.

 

* * *

 

Carolina waits until her own head is in order to slot Church’s data chip into her armor. 

The way he’d reacted in there- it was too much like them.  It sounded too much like the voices, too much like her mother’s name screaming into her head.  It had felt like dropping to her knees, like slapping Tex’s hand away as she curled in on herself, as her fingers twitched against the implants screwed into her skull, as she desperately fought the urge to just rip them out when they wouldn’t shut up, they _couldn’t shut up._

She doesn’t remember much from when she was out.  She’d expected lucid dreams; maybe something dramatic, something like meeting Eta and Iota in her brainspace or something like that.  Sitting down and having a heart-to-heart.

Instead it was darkness, and a vague sense of unease that still hasn’t quite left her alone.

The twins were so quiet after that.  When she’d first gotten them they’d been a little quiet, content to be with each other and running in the background.  She’d challenged Tex immediately because she couldn’t wait, couldn’t _wait_ to see what they could do for her.  She was so tired of losing out to the shadiest motherfucker on their team, the one who came up behind them and blew entire complexes sky-high, the one who’d _killed Connie_ and who was just too ruthless, too quick to break other people.  She couldn’t leave her team in the hands of _her._ She couldn’t let herself be usurped by someone like that.

She couldn’t let someone like _that_ come between whatever tenuous relationship she still had with her father.

If she’d just known what Texas was, would things have been any different?

Carolina never asked herself these things until she informally implanted Epsilon.  He pulled her past out of her in shards, in little pieces, and pressed bittersweet memories into the holes he left behind.  For some reason this abrasive, self-important little jackass has taken it upon himself to keep Carolina from being alone.  She doesn’t think it’s out of a sense of pity, or even a sense of duty; whatever relation they have as family is a stretch by even the most liberal definitions of the word, and Epsilon never really cared much about what he was _supposed_ to do rather than what he _wanted_ to do.

But she still remembers his whisper on the way back to the desert, _Do you want to hear the twins’ voices?_ into the silence of her head, unsure but so painfully willing to try.  She hadn’t, and he didn’t ask again, but something was forged between them after York’s journal entries, after his confession (“I know what it’s like to spend your life chasing after ghosts,”), after Carolina stopped to really think about what Alpha must have gone through and what Epsilon inherited because of that.

For all his posturing, she still remembers that sharp jab of alarm when she’d leveled that pistol at Tucker’s head.

His chip clicks into the back of her helmet and she waits.

Usually Church would transfer himself immediately over to her implants and suit’s hardware; said he hated being in the chip, that it was like being carted around in a sense-deprivation doggie purse.  But even when she manually pings the chip with the hardware of her suit to get his attention, he doesn’t move.

His avatar flickers to life in front of her helmet though.  And when he speaks, it isn’t directly into her head.  “Carolina, I-”

“Transfer over, Church,” she orders.

The avatar bows his head and winks out and after a moment, she feels the shift of data pouring into her implants.  The neural weight of it is comforting, even though she can feel the walls between her and Church like a tangible thing.  “All the way.”

 _Not yet,_ Church mutters.  _I’m- I gotta check.  To make sure._

“You’re not rampant.”

_I know that.  Doesn’t mean I still can’t fuck you up.  Keep your panties on and let me assess, Jesus._

The irritation is much more familiar than the hesitant remorse he’d been wearing a moment ago so Carolina bites her tongue and waits, leaning back against a nearby wall and crossing her arms.  The barriers between them slowly thin until he’s there with her again, all the way, still keeping himself carefully separate but open and available for her to look, if she wants.  His way of asking for forgiveness.  “That was pretty bad in there,” she starts cautiously.

The following mental wince isn’t her own.  _Some of the sessions- I was- I mean, the Alpha was-_ His exasperation with himself bleeds through.  _They were like that.  There’d be a situation: complete the mission or save the agents, and it was my- his job to come up with a solution to do both.  But he never could.  Not fast enough._

Carolina can absolutely see them coming up with something like that.  The Agents had similar training simulations, toward the end.  Sacrifice your teammates or achieve the objective.  Looking back on it, Carolina’s embarrassed at how long it took them to realize something was terribly wrong with how the Project operated…or maybe it was just that none of them had _wanted_ to realize it.

Except Connie.

_She wasn’t your fault._

“It doesn’t matter now,” Carolina says harshly.  She’s never opening that again, not if she can help it.

_Healthy._

“And you’re the poster child for mental health?”  When Epsilon doesn’t come back with a witty retort Carolina revises her approach.  “Something in there set you off.”

_I guess you could…say that.  Yeah._

“That’s PTSD, you know.”

His laughter is weak.  _Can a memory fragment of an outdated AI even **have** PTSD?_

It’s a good question.  “That’s how I explained it to Kimball and Doyle.”

 _Ahh, shit._ Epsilon goes dull in her head with a flicker of upset.   _I’m on lockdown, aren’t I?_

“You are.”  Carolina taps the side of her helmet.  “House arrest, until you get looked over by Grey and Simmons.”  His answering silence is all she needs to know how he feels about _that._   “I don’t like it either, but it’s not as if you’re in the brig.  If you think of something that needs to be communicated, you can tell it to me.”

_…thanks._

“Epsilon…I’m sorry for what Alpha- for what _you_ went through, but what happened in there cannot happen again.  Ever.”

_I know._

“If it comes down to it I don’t know how far I can protect you.”

_I know, I know.  Trust me, I get it.  Still UNSC property._

Carolina shifts her weight, then flips off her external speakers and drops her voice to a whisper to keep it inside of her helmet.  “I let Wash go knowing this might happen.”

Epsilon’s faint surprise curls gently through her mind, a tendril of curiosity.  _Why **did** you let him go?_

“Wash needed to.”  Carolina lets out a slow breath, flexing her fingers.  She has her own issues with sitting on the sidelines, but she’s never been _forced_ there.  Not like Washington has.  “He’s spent too much time picking up the pieces.  I couldn’t treat him like the Project did.  Out of all of us, he at least deserves to try.”

The curiosity curdles.  Epsilon’s voice, which never sounds the same in her head as when he speaks with her suit’s audio system, gentles into something young and afraid.  _You think they could die._

“They could.”  She refuses to flinch from his stab of panic.  “ _But_ I know that Wash has the best chance to find them.  He knows them.”  Tucker and Caboose are her family as well, having long since integrated themselves into her daily life but…she doesn’t have the ease with them that Washington does, the familiarity.  Not yet.  It hurts sometimes, maybe even makes her envious, but this is just one thing that Wash is a little better at than she is.  She can allow him one thing, she thinks.

_What if he doesn’t find them in time?_

“He won’t leave without them.”  Carolina nods to herself, to Epsilon.  “And if there’s anything you can count on with Wash, it’s that he’ll survive.”

 

* * *

 

Before, in the Project, whenever Wash got choice paralysis someone would always swoop in and make a decision for him.  _Decisive action is pivotal to mission success,_ Carolina would always tell him sternly.  _You can’t allow yourself to be distracted by what ifs.  You have to act._

Wash got better at it.  And then, after that, he got a little _too_ good at it.  He told himself _decisive action_ as he fought for Alpha to come with him, as he slammed a hand against the EMP authorization console and watched his one-time friend drop like a rock.  He told himself _I have to act_ as he sold out the Reds and Blues to Hargrove, as he put a gun to the back of Simmons’s head and forced him to make a call.  What he hadn’t learned was that while decisive action was pivotal to mission success, the consequences of it will steal away your peace until you forget what it’s like to have it.

There in Valhalla, stealing flags and rations and _banana bread_ from the Reds, lounging around in an empty base with Tucker leaning against his shoulder as he howled with laughter, Wash found what peace felt like again.  Losing it now would be too much, he _can’t_ go back to that, he _can’t-_

 _Decisive action._ In the time it’ll take Wash to search the surrounding area, Tucker and Caboose might make their way up.  He can just leave a message for them, if he can find something to write with he can leave them messages to follow so that they know, so they’ll know he’s there for them.  If they’re still here (still alive)-

 _No,_ he can’t.  He _cannot_ consider the alternative.  Within the alternative is a yawning dark pit that feels like scrambling in a medical bay, half-delirious as the metal plating beneath his feet bucks; it feels like listening to hours of static, trying to find a reason to suspend his disbelief; it feels like putting a bullet into the head of a robot and the chest of a soldier.

If Caboose and Tucker are dead, if this mission’s killed them, he’ll-

The door up on the bridge hisses open behind him.  Heart pounding, Wash snaps around and almost puts a bullet right into the visor of a soldier in aqua and for one frozen, terrifying second he thinks he can see the squirm of tentacles in the neck of his survival suit.  For one suspended moment, Wash stares into that yawning pit and contemplates what it would be like to fall again down into it.

“Wash?!” 

And then the second passes.

They’re both there, _both of them_ , Tucker with his sword in hand and Caboose looming behind him, helmet scraping the top of the hallway as he clutches at Tucker’s armor.  For a moment too long Wash stares, expecting to see something to deny him this before Tucker is stumbling out of the way and Caboose is barreling over the edge of the lightbridge, “Oh god Caboose, be _careful_ don’t just-” and then scrabbling up to his feet.

“Wash,” Caboose shouts and throws his arms around him before he’s really even ready, hefting him right into the air and shoving his helmet against his chestplate.  _“Agent Washington!”_

His ribs are _not_ in the soundest condition after that disaster of a firefight but he can’t bear to tell Caboose to let him go.  He’s not sure he could form the words even if he _wanted_ to; his brain stalls, his heart sticks in his throat as he looks up at Tucker leaning against the doorjamb and watching them, whole, _alive._   He’d spent the past ten hours convincing himself that they had to be all right, they had to be okay that he’d stopped actually believing it.

But they _are_ okay.  They’re okay and once again, they’ve proven him the fool.  Wash has never been so happy to be wrong.

 Speaking feels too huge a task to undertake so Wash just rests a hand atop Caboose’s helmet and waits for Caboose to start babbling about his day, about how _happy_ he is and how much he’d missed him and Church and everybody else.  It’s how Caboose works, how he operates; he never dams up his feelings, he allows himself to experience them fully and joy is almost always at the forefront of it.  He could chat about anything and everything to anyone who would listen.

But this time he doesn’t.

Tucker shuffles over to the edge of the bridge and Wash can see from here that he’s hurt somehow, his arm isn’t moving so either he’s holding his gut or his arm.  His armor is scuffed and Wash doesn’t see any blood, but he’s definitely wounded and Wash feels that electric urge to _act_.  He tenses and tries to pull back out of Caboose’s grip but he’s still there, still holding Wash up  with his helmet tucked down against his chest and-

 _Oh god, he’s hiding._   “Oh _buddy_ ,” Wash murmurs on reflex, and he rubs the top of Caboose’s helmet.  “Caboose, it’s okay.  I said I would come get you and I’m here, right?”

“That was so long ago,” Caboose chokes out.

Shit.  No, _shit,_ he’s crying, this is so awful and bad, Wash needs to go hunt down Felix and Locus and every Flood form in the jungle and make them deeply regret their existence.  “I know.  I’m so sorry I’m late.  Did you think I wasn’t coming?”

Caboose shakes his head.

“Think you could put me down?  I’m not going anywhere, big guy.”  Once Wash is firmly back on his feet he coaxes Caboose into sitting down on a nearby overturned crate.  There aren’t any obvious wounds; no punctures in his armor, no blood leaking anywhere, no awkwardly-angled joints.  He looks all right, except for the way he keeps twisting his fingers together and his inability to hold Wash’s gaze for more than a few seconds.  Right.  He might be having a hard time with that about now.

Wash pats Caboose’s shoulder before reaching behind himself and detaching Freckles from the magstrip on his back.  “Look, I’ve got somebody for you.”

“ _Freckles,_ ” Caboose cries and accepts the frantically buzzing rifle immediately, cuddling the AI close to his chest.  “Oh, I’m so happy you’re alive!  Thank you Agent Washington-!”

Wash smiles at the sight before turning his attention to Tucker, still up on the bridge.  “Can you make it down?”

“Yeah,” he grunts, sitting down on the edge and dangling his legs over.  “It’s just my shoulder.”

“C’mon.”  When Tucker drops down Wash reaches out to steady him.  “Armor lock?”

“Dislocated.”  Tucker hisses when Wash gently prods at the survival suit over his shoulder.  “It’s fine, it’s back in the socket.  Just hurts like a bitch.”

“It’s definitely swollen.  Soon as we get back, you need to see Dr. Grey.”

“Wash.”  Tucker grabs Washington’s arm.  “We can’t go yet.  We’ve got to take out this building.”

“Yeah, I’ve got four barrels of high-octane explosives on the roof for that.  Let’s go.”

“No, I mean _everything._ There’s a ton of tunnels and shit underground; we’ve gotta make sure we’ll roast this whole facility along with the jungle before we go _anywhere._ ”

Wash stops, tilts his head as he takes in the image of Tucker before him.  The way he’s half-hunched with his arm locked to the armor plates on his stomach, the way he stares back unwaveringly, his right hand on the hilt of his plasma sword.  Twitchy and shell shocked and so, so brave.  “Okay,” he says slowly.  He hears Caboose stand up and shuffle closer behind them, feeding a fresh clip into Freckles.  Wash glances between his teammates before moving to build a makeshift staircase back up onto the bridge.  “All right, I get you.  But first, we’re going back to the Pelican to radio in and do some first aid on _both_ of you.”

“Dude no, that’s too far, we gotta do this now-”

“Too far- Tucker, the Pelican’s up on the roof.  It won’t take that long.”

“What?”  Tucker leans back.  “On the roof _here?_ How’d you know we were here?”

Wash pauses in shoving a supply crate closer to the walkway.  “Why _wouldn’t_ you be here?  Didn’t you retreat?”

“Yeah we _did_ retreat, and then we walked forever through the stupid jungle and then we fell down this ventilation shaft thing.  How’d you find us all the way over here?”

Okay, _now_ he’s fearing a concussion.  Washington points to the merc camp.  “Tucker, we’re inside the ruins.”

Tucker whips around to stare at the camp, then back at Wash.  “What?”

“The shaft you fell down must’ve been for the tunnels in here.  This is the temple you scouted.”

“Are you telling me,” Tucker says lowly, “that the ventilation shaft we fell down was in the temple’s _fucking backyard_?”  He clutches at his helmet.  “ _Oh my god._   We were walking in a circle!  _We went in a fucking circle!_ ”

Oh god.  It’s a miracle they weren’t caught by Felix.  “Tucker, why didn’t you use the compass function on your HUD?”

“The what?!”

“The- you removed it, didn’t you?”  Wash buries his face in his hands and the laugh that bubbles up is close to hysterical.  “Of course you did.  Probably because it was annoying you.”

“Holy shit Wash, _who uses a compass anymore._ ”

“You!  You could have used one in this _exact situation!_ ”

“ _I am also angry about camping supplies_ ,” Caboose hollers.

“Or you could’ve used the GPS function to track your coordinates!”

Tucker thrusts a finger at Wash.  “Okay _that_ is not my fault!  I couldn’t get a satellite uplink out here, it wasn’t giving me updates on my coordinates!”

“Which is what the _compass function is for-_ ”

“This isn’t the stone ages Wash, _nobody uses a compass_!”

Caboose rocks back on his heels.  “Actually the compass wasn’t invented until about 200 BC, and it wasn’t used for military purposes until 1000 AD?  Sooo, not the Stone Age.”

“Tucker,” Wash says hotly and he doesn’t know why he’s so angry, why he wants to just reach out and strangle him when he’s been spending the hours between their last transmission and now desperate to find his teammates, shove them into the back of a Pelican and take them far away from here.  It must be some innate quality Tucker has that makes even his closest friends feel like murdering him.  “Don’t you get that you could’ve _died_?  I thought you two were dead.  I _thought you were dead._ ”

“Yeah I know that Wash, _I was the one who almost died!_ ”  Tucker gestures.  “There’s all these Flood things and then fucking _Locus_ shows up-”

Wash starts.  “ _Locus_ came after you?  I saw Felix up on the roof.”

“Great!  Fucking great!  Then they’re _both_ here!”  Tucker lets out a sound like he’d just ejected all the air in his body and lifts his hand to his visor.  “God.”

“We’ll handle it, Tucker.”  But the both of them being here…that’s not good.  Wash glances over his shoulder, like he’s expecting them to pop out from inside a crate like some old time villainous duo.  “That you’re not dead now says a lot; they’re probably just as thrown as we are by the Flood.”

The laugh Tucker gives him is one he doesn’t like to hear, not in that voice, not from him.  “Dude, I have _no idea_ how we aren’t dead yet.  Not for fucking lack of trying!  Even _Caboose_ tried to kick it at least once during this field trip, it’s like dying is the fucking _theme._ ”

Caboose sputters in indignation.  “Well yeah, but I didn’t faint _nearly_ as much as Tucker!”

“Shut up, Caboose.”

“Tucker fainted like _four times,_ it’s really getting kind of old.  We agreed he’s just doing it for attention.”

“Shut _up_ Caboose!  It wasn’t fainting it was _falling unconscious,_ and it was only like three times!”

“ _Focus,_ ” Wash interrupts, and is blindsided by a wave of gratitude and relief so strong that it almost staggers him.  God.  He might never have had the chance to reign in his loud teammates ever again.

“Three times is more than one time!  I think!  …Tucker, is-”

“Yes, Caboose, three is more than one but since all the times I passed out I was _breathing_ then yours counts for quadruple.”

“I don’t know how much that is but I don’t agree anyway!”

“I gave you mouth-to-mouth you fucking ingrate!”

“Yeah well!  I’m sure I did some stuff too!”

“You didn’t, I was there.  I would've remembered you doing stuff.”

“I didn’t?  Well that doesn’t sound like me…”

“ _Guys._ ”  What Wash intends to say is something like, _we need to get moving so at least fight along the way._   Something to refocus them, to pull their attention back to the matter at hand because they’ll go on forever like this if he doesn’t stop them.

But he can’t.  These are the two soldiers who’d saved his life in Sidewinder, who dressed him up like their own dead (presumed dead) friend to keep him from going back to prison, right after he’d tried killing all of them to save his own skin.  These two men are the ones who looked out for him those few tenuous weeks before Carolina caught up to him.  They’re the ones who made sure he ate once in a while, who never let him go far without one of them following behind (poorly) to make sure he came back.

They probably thought they were being stealthy about it but Wash saw it all.  He overheard their whispered arguments in the hall about the best way to wake him from nightmares, about how to get him to agree to eat, about what they should do if he tried to run.  He’d resented a lot of it at the time; all he’d wanted was to be alone in his misery.  He didn’t know how to be properly grateful, because he’d forgotten how to recognize kindness for what it was.

He’d come so close to losing that today.  So instead of an order, instead of reprimanding them for wasting time Wash swallows and clutches his rifle, looking between them as he tries to straighten his voice out when he says, “I’m so glad you guys are all right.”

Tucker and Caboose quiet down, glancing at each other.  Caboose turns to Wash and hugs Freckles to his chest, and his voice is the warmth of a campfire on a cold night when he says, “We’re happy you’re alright too, Agent Washington.”

“Oh my god you guys,” Tucker mutters, staring down at his feet.  “Don’t be all gay about it.”

“Tucker,” Caboose scolds.

“What?  Ugh, don’t look at me like that.”  Tucker sniffs and shrugs his shoulder and Wash wants to shake him, wants to shove him, wants to reach out and do _some_ thing. “Fine, I guess I’m.  Happy to see you too.  So let’s just go already.”

Caboose takes the lead, chattering happily to Freckles despite the AI’s inability to answer back, clambering up the supply crates Wash pushed into position and making an awful racket.  Wash takes a moment to look at Tucker again, to recognize the stance of a soldier exhausted but determined and he again marvels at how far Tucker can go when he puts his mind to it and refuses to break.  He doesn’t know why but he feels compelled to make sure Tucker _gets_ that, so he leans in and taps Tucker’s helmet with his own to get his attention.

“Good job, soldier,” Wash murmurs, pulling back.

Tucker bows his head.  “…wouldn’t have made it this far without Caboose.”

“And he wouldn’t have made it without you.”  Wash leans in again and this time he lets his helmet rest there against Tucker’s, the moment between them stretching out quiet and meaningful.  “You achieved your objective.  You’re both alive.  You did good work.”

Tucker doesn’t have anything to say to that, but his good hand comes up and clutches at Wash’s armor, and they stay like that together until Caboose calls for them up on the bridge.

 

* * *

 

Great.

Fucking _beautiful._

Felix waits for their bootfalls to fade into the distance before pinging his and Locus’s shared frequency with the sort of aggression he usually reserves for hanging up on Control.  He could be shouting into the void here but hey, sometimes that’s cathartic.  “Whatever happened to you disposing of the sim troopers?  Because in case you were unaware, gang’s all back together!”

Fuzzing static is his answer.

“Asshole.”

_-xpected complications._

Oh good.  Cathartic or not, Felix much prefers to shout where people can hear him.  “Uh, were those complications you being shit at stalking and murdering?  Because you were basically _gift wrapped_ the opportunity to pop their heads clean off their shoulders.  Tucker’s even _crippled_ for god’s sake.”

 _Enough.  I had too much to contend with._   Even with all the interference Felix can hear that irritated, two-seconds-from-trading-blows growl to Locus’s voice that isn’t just a little satisfying to bear witness to when Felix knows he’s the cause of it.  Good.  Locus should be every bit as irritated as Felix is over this shit.  They’ve been chasing these clowns around the fucking jungle for hours now and haven’t murdered even _one_ of them.  Maybe they should just avoid calling Control about this altogether, Felix can only take so much condescension from somebody before he can no longer fight off the urge to put a few knives into them.

Still.  This isn’t like Locus anyway.  Usually he gets it done quick and boring.  For a while now Felix has been worried about how much use he’ll continue to be; he gives the sim troopers too much credit.  He might still buy into that ‘respect your enemy’ bullshit their CO force fed them years ago, but Felix knows better; respect leads to admiration, and admiration leads to hesitating when you should be striking.  Better to hate your enemy like the garbage they are from the very start.  Then the satisfaction of watching them bleed out is all the sweeter.

“So what exactly were you contending with?”

_There are more of the creatures down below.  A few of them our men._

“How _many_ more?”

_Many.  Mostly Sangheili._

Well shit.  Felix can handle a couple dozen of those, but Locus’s ‘many’ generally means more than that.  Guy doesn’t take well to hyperbole.  “And you’re sneaking around them.”

_They’re making their way up behind me.  We’ll be overrun soon if we stay here._

All right.  All right, they can use this.  “I’ve got an idea.”

_What._

“There’s a pretty hefty bomb setup on the roof.  They were talking about taking out this whole facility before they go anywhere.  Don’t know why they _care,_ it’s just a bunch of stupid zombies-”

_The small creatures I encountered weren’t like that.  They burrowed into the skulls of our men._

“Oh that’s fucking gross.”  Felix fakes a gag before he stops.  Wait.  Wait a hot second.  Small creatures trying to crawl into people’s heads- “Fuck!  Wolkowsky!”

_Ramirez._

” _Whoever,_ ” Felix grits out.  “Don’t you think telling me about what the little ones do was pertinent information?!”

_If I **had** , I would have **shared it.**_

Ugh.  _Ugh._   “You asshole, those big ones come from the little ones squishing around in people’s brains!  Jesus Christ, I saw some of the little ones on the way down, fucking _fuck_ I could’ve been a George Romero extra.”

_Felix.  Your idea._

Right.  His idea.  Well, he definitely knows why they want to take out the complex so badly now.  “They’re not gonna use that bomb without getting some explosives set up further down inside the temple, especially if they’re looking to take out all your little hide-and-seek pals.  So while they fuck around down here, I’m going up to screw with their setup and get our ride.  Meanwhile you see if you can take ‘em out when they come down.  If you can’t, whatever, just piss off all the monsters and then book it topside.”

The white noise he gets in response isn’t exactly reassuring.  “ _Well?_ ”

_I expected you to want to handle the sim troopers personally._

“Look.”  Felix blows out an angry breath.  “I want to flay Tucker, don’t get me wrong.  I would _love_ to cut his tongue out and like, I don’t know, nail it to Washington’s door or something, but this monster shit is _not_ in the contract.  And you know what else isn’t in the contract?  Getting fucking blown up.”

 _True._   And it’s not often Felix gets Locus to agree with him, so he savors it.  _They’ve shown willingness to sacrifice themselves for the greater good before.  We shouldn’t dismiss the notion that they may decide to destroy this facility with themselves inside of it._

“Tucker’s a piece of shit.”  And while letting him just waltz by had taken an _incredible_ amount of self-control for which Felix should honestly receive a goddamn medal, “So I’m sure he’ll give me _plenty_ of opportunities to take him out after this.  I mean, assuming he doesn’t blow his own ass up.  Which I will do my fucking damnedest to ensure.”

 _All right._   And then Locus’s voice takes on that weird sharp edge, the one that makes Felix wonder if they actually _do_ work well together, or if they really just only stick together because everyone else is incompetent.  _Do **not** leave without me, Felix._

“Are you kidding me?  Fuck, I don’t want to deal with all the whining from Control if you end up dead.  I’d have to talk to that prick all by my lonesome.  That’s like, twice the amount of words I’ll have to say to him.  Forget it.”

Ah there he goes, back to the normal growl.  _Just get it done._

“You got it, charmer.  Put a bullet in at least one of their skulls, would you?”  Felix cuts the call before Locus can get a word in.  He’s got some ground to cover.

 

* * *

 

There’s thunder in Kimball’s voice when she picks up the radio.  “Agent Washington, you are almost _four hours-_ ”

“I found them,” Wash interjects, because he _knows_ when he gets back that he’s in incredibly deep shit.  “I have Tucker and Caboose here, they’re- well not unhurt, but uninfected.”

“Kimball,” Tucker calls from the back of the Pelican, “I want that bottle of liquor you have in your desk drawer for this shit!  You at least owe me that if you’re not gonna send me any nudes!”

“Hello Principal Kimball,” Caboose says pleasantly as he unwraps his third ration bar.

There’s a pause just a beat too long before Kimball responds again.  “Good.  That’s- that’s good.”

Doyle, for his part, doesn’t even try to hide his relief.  “Agent Washington, it’s so good to hear your voice.  I’m-”  He pauses, then continues gently, “I’m _infinitely_ glad we didn’t have to resort to other measures.”

“You and me both, General,” Wash sighs.  That they’d waited four hours past his check in time was more generosity than he’d expected to get.  Well, more generosity and more foolishness.  Maybe Carolina vouched for him.

“What can you tell us about the situation, Wash?” Kimball asks.

“It’s a lot more complicated than we thought.  Tucker, do you want to explain?”

“Not really.”

“Tucker.”

“ _Ugh._ ”  Tucker sighs and draws up a knee, slotting on his helmet one-handed with some difficulty and patching his radio into the Pelican’s frequency.  “Okay, so- is Church there?”

Kimball’s voice is stiff when she answers, “Agent Carolina is on her way.”

“Did he tell you guys about that Forerunner crap?”

“Yes,” Doyle says, “he’d mentioned that.”

“Caboose and I found a couple weird things down in these old tunnels under the ruins: this huuuuge huge stockpile of alien weapons and this old ass video from way back when the Sangheili were colonizing this place.  They kept saying something about Creators and weapons and stuff with this big glass case of Flood in the background –which, by the way, did _not_ work out for those guys in the end.  Glass apparently doesn’t hold these things off.  It was awful.”

“Quite,” Doyle says, voice strangled.

“Look I dunno what they were saying, but it looked like they were gonna try and fight the Flood.  It makes sense, right?  If they were trying to colonize the planet and build all their shit here, you definitely don’t want that kind of neighbor.  And I mean like, if you didn’t have plans to kill the crap out of stuff, why else would you pile a bunch of guns in a room?”

“I can think of a few other reasons, but you have my attention.  What does this have to do with us now?”

“Tucker, Caboose?!  Jesus Christ!  You two can’t go fucking _anywhere_ without becoming somebody else’s headache!”

“Church is here!”  Caboose immediately bounds into the cockpit of the Pelican.  “Church, I missed you so much!  I have so many stories to tell you!”

“Caboose shut up,” Church snaps, but it says something about his worry that his tone softens before he continues with, “look, just, you just hold your horses.  We’ll…hang out…when you all get back.”

“Oh my god,” Caboose whispers reverently.

Wash escorts him hastily back over to his seat before he can work himself up into a screaming fit of excitement.  “Okay okay, Caboose you finish eating and then you can talk to Church.”  He turns toward the radio.  “Felix and Locus are here too.”

Carolina curses.  “I’ll start on my way over-”

“There’s no time,” Wash interrupts, glancing over at Tucker, who nods.  “We need to figure out how to take out this whole building.”

“ _Why?”_ Church’s voice is sharp with desperation.  “Jesus Christ, just torch the fucking forest and get out of there already, who gives a fuck about the fucking building-”

“They’re _testing facilities_ ,” Tucker snaps impatiently.  “The Forerunners used this stupid sadsack rock to trap these things and _weaponize_ them.  Because that’s totally a sound plan!  Because that’s a plan that’s _never_ fucked anybody over!”

“Okay, okay,” Wash says, holding up a hand.  “You’re not going to get an argument out of any of us, Tucker.”

“Wrong, I’m arguing!  Right now!”

“Church,” Carolina says, “Tucker’s right.”

“I must agree with Agent Carolina,” Doyle adds.  “With Charon’s forces investigating the ruins, leaving anything standing for them to salvage is a recipe for disaster.  Can you imagine if they managed to acquire the data on the Flood species while there?  Or _samples_ of the creatures?  We wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“Is that bomb you brought gonna be enough to collapse all the tunnels, though?”

Wash’s tone is grim when he answers, “Probably not.”

“ _Definitely_ not,” Kimball says.  “I only had it engineered for surface deploy and fire.  It won’t have the concussive force necessary to collapse the structure.”

Caboose pipes up around his fourth ration bar, “Why don’t we just blow up the underground too?”

Tucker groans.  “Yes, Caboose.  That’s what we’re _trying to figure out how to do._ ”

Church interrupts, “No, no no wait.  No he’s right.  Didn’t you guys mention something about there being what looked like an armory in there?”

Washington and Tucker both stare at Caboose, then each other.  “The ammunitions dump.”

“Exactly.  Bring a barrel down from the roof, run a cable along with it-”

“-get it into where they put all the extra fuel cells and shit, yeah!”  Tucker smacks a hand against the Pelican’s deck.  “That’d probably take out the whole fucking jungle!”

Wash thumps Caboose on the chest excitedly.  “Caboose, you’re _brilliant._ ”

Caboose blushes and ducks his head.  “Aww, _Wash_.”

“ _He’s_ brilliant?” Church asks incredulously.

“Do we have enough cable to run it all the way down there though?”

“How the hell is _he_ the brilliant one?!”

“There should be enough on the Pelican to at least get it down the elevator,” Wash muses, “but we might need to haul some of the fuel cells up and spread them along, just to make sure they ignite.  We can crack open some of them I think; plasma burns pretty well.”

Tucker jerks his chin at the duffel.  “What about the flares?”

“Good idea.  We can litter the shells through hallway, that should help-”

“Royally fuck up their day?”

“I was going to say assist with combustion, but sure, that works too.”

The radio crackles with static before Kimball’s voice returns.  “Then get moving.  I don’t want you three there any longer than you have to be.”

“Shit, you and me both.”  Tucker slides down from the Pelican.  “Get that liquor ready for me.”

“In your dreams, Captain.”  But Kimball’s voice holds a smile.  “Armonia out.”

Washington watches as Caboose slots his helmet back on, as Tucker passes the duffel over to him.  “If you two wanted to stay up here with the Pelican, I can do this alone.”

Tucker snorts.  “Right, because you can _totally_ carry one of those heavy-ass barrels all the way down an elevator that won’t work without my awesome sword.  You need us, and we’re coming.  That’s that.”  Tucker taps his fist against Wash’s chest as he passes by and heads for the bomb setup.  “C’mon, let’s fuckin’ finish up already!  We gotta make it back so we can rub this in the Reds’ faces.  Blue Team _always_ gets shit done.”

“Yeah, go Blue Team!” Caboose bounds down from the Pelican after Tucker.  “Better Red than dead!  …wait, I think I messed that up.”

“Yeah dude, you did.”

After a moment of grateful staring that he’s not sure will ever get old, Wash stows his rifle and follows his team.  “You’ll get it right next time, Caboose.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S LATE i'm sorry  
> pls also tell me if there's anything incoherent in here, i have no beta but i must write


	6. Boomboom Backpack

Church makes his displeasure with being poked at obvious, not that it has any bearing on what Dr. Grey is doing.  Maybe if Carolina could make heads or tails of what the doctor was actually doing, she’d help her along so they could leave sooner.  She’d thought she knew a lot given her father’s penchant for thinking aloud as he worked but she’s finding out today that she actually knows very, very little beyond basic maintenance which, of course, Epsilon conducts himself anyway.  _Simmons_ knew more than she did.  Which gave him a desperately needed ego boost, but still.  It wasn’t something she wanted out as public knowledge.

“How long is this gonna _take,_ ” Epsilon complains loudly, pacing around atop the small holopad as Dr. Grey scrolls through lines of coding.

“Much longer than normal,” she informs him cheerfully.  “My understanding of the assembly process involved in personality matrix entry quanta is a _liiiiittle_ bit rusty!  I dropped the topic in favor of biological psychology.  _Way_ more interesting.  Artificial psychology is too predictable!”

Church sputters and Carolina grins.  “What the fuck, I’m not predictable!”

“Oh, you are.”

“I’m not!”

Dr. Grey consults the windows of coding and clicks her tongue.  “You’ve explored only _sixteen_ different conversational outcomes according to my potential responses.  Hm.  You _are_ overtaxed.”

“I hate this.  I hate _you,_ ” Church hisses at Carolina accusingly when her shoulders tremble with suppressed laughter.

“This is part of the deal,” Carolina reminds him, unable to completely remove the amusement from her voice.  “Just hang in there, I’m sure she’ll be finished soon.  It wasn’t so bad with Simmons, right?”

“Simmons doesn’t know what the fuck he’s looking at,” Church scoffs.  “People think just because he’s smart that he can do all sorts of shit.  That moron couldn’t hack an ATM without two days of mental preparation.”

Dr. Grey tabs through code screens faster than Carolina can follow.  “Captain Simmons is capable of at least the standard AI troubleshooting, so he was very helpful in getting that out of the way!”

“So he’s your tier one IT support.”

“More or less!”

“Don’t tell him that,” Carolina warns Church, hands on her hips.  “You’ll hurt his feelings.”

“Coughing in his direction hurts his feelings.”

“ _Oookay_ , I think I’ve got you all figured out!”  At Church’s displeased silence she waves a hand.  “Don’t be so defensive.  You were _put together_ to be understood!  It’s not your fault.”

“Thanks,” Church mutters.

“While the UNSC data _is_ bogging you down, unless you’re actively accessing all the files at once it shouldn’t affect your performance overly much.  Your hard storage capacity is pretty impressive for such a little guy.”

Church’s avatar buries his helmet in his hands.  “God, could you get _any_ more condescending?”

“Probably,” Carolina says.

“Epsilon, let me ask you!  Do you sleep?”

Church lifts his head from his hands.  “Huh?  Do I sleep?  No.”

Dr. Grey crosses her legs, leaning an elbow on her desk.  “You should _probably_ start doing that.”

“You don’t sleep?” Carolina asks accusingly.  “How am _I_ sleeping then?  I thought I couldn’t sleep if you didn’t shut down.”

Church at least has the decency to look sheepish.  “I just…y’know, run background on the hardware in your suit.  Or the room.  Whatever’s available.”  At Carolina’s stormy silence he waves his hands.  “Hey, don’t look at me!  It wasn’t keeping you up so I figured it was okay!”

“Nope!  Completely wrong.  Maybe if you were a brand new AI you could run for months without rest but unfortunately, you’re not!  Your personality has too many elements and you have too many memories for that to work.  So!  Nightly shutdowns.  You should also make every attempt to defrag and clean up junk files whenever you have downtime.”

“I don’t _have_ downtime,” Church argues.

“ _Make_ downtime!” Dr. Grey chirps.  “This isn’t just friendly advice; this is about your life expectancy.  You’re already past due the lifespan of conventional AI, and while your longevity can be attributed to the fragmentation process that created you, that _doesn’t_ mean you’re immune to the affects!  You think too much.  So,” Dr. Grey makes a snipping motion with her fingers, “cut it out!”

“Thank you,” Carolina interrupts before Church can really work himself up into a rant, reaching down for his storage chip.  His avatar disappears as he preps for transfer and she can almost taste the amount of sulking he’s going to do once he’s back in her head.  “So is he safe?”

Dr. Grey rocks up onto her feet as Carolina slots the chip into the back of her helmet.  “For now.  Moreso if he follows the treatment plan.”

“Hear that, Church?  You are _following that plan_.  I need you functional.”  Church doesn’t appear at her shoulder, just prods an idea of _leave already_ at her as firmly as possible.  She can’t entirely blame him.  The Counselor’s obsession with figuring out all the agents made her wary of this sort of interaction too.  The way Dr. Grey is looking at her curiously definitely doesn’t sit well with her either.  “Thanks again, doctor.”

“No problem!” she sings as Carolina leaves.

The walk back to the war room is mercifully quiet.  Epsilon seems disinclined to speak after his time with Dr. Grey and Carolina enjoys the comforting hum of him performing menial tasks (hopefully maintenance) as they head down the streets.  “Hey,” she calls softly after a while.  “They’re all right now.  Are you good?”

 _Yeah, yeah.  I’d feel better if they were actually **back** but.  They’ll get it done._   Church rummages around a bit more before she feels his presence in the forefront of his mind, more conversational.  _Caboose is late on his meds.  He’s probably causing trouble._

“I’m sure Wash and Tucker can handle him.”

_Yeah but his schedule’s all fucked up now.  I’ll have to breathe down his neck about it until he gets back with the routine.  I just got him used to going to sleep on time, god damn it._

Carolina stops outside her quarters before heading inside.

_Tucker missed his physical.  He was supposed to get checked out- you know he has to get an ultrasound every six months now?  Because of Junior.  Didn’t get them before because shockingly, fake armies don’t give a fuck if your organs are all rearranged after you pop out a parasitic alien baby.  Dr. Grey said he’s lucky he doesn’t need corrective surgery._

Carolina sits on her bunk and removes her helmet, turning it over in her lap and snapping open the maintenance panel.

_Washington’s recruits must be having a field day without him there to scare the daylights out of them for once.  I wonder if any of what’s going on is going to be published.  Probably not, right?  I’ve been marking all communications as highest clearance.  Figure there’s no reason to cause a panic until we know whether or not if we’re all fuckin’ doomed._

She feels around for the series of switches in her helmet; tugs free her glove when she can’t fit her finger in far enough, then flicks them over.

_He- What’re you doing, hey!_

“I’m making it so you can’t access my armor without me wearing it,” Carolina grunts.

 _Oh my god.  Don’t you trust me?_ He pauses. _Okay don’t answer that. You **should** though!  I said I was gonna do it-_

“You never actually said you would.”

_Okay well but.  It’s like, y’know, implied and shit-_

“Epsilon.”  Carolina rests her helmet on her knee.  “This is going to sound incredibly hypocritical coming from me, but listen up: you do too much.”

_You’re right.  That’s hypocritical as shit._

“The Generals don’t need you to anticipate their orders, Washington doesn’t need you to consider informing his recruits.  Tucker doesn’t need you to track his appointments.  Caboose,” she trails off, considering.  “All right, Caboose probably _does_ need the help, but you could just as easily write a subroutine into his room’s monitoring system and let it handle his reminders.  You don’t need to be doing that personally.”

Church sits in her head and there it is, the sulk.  He’s sulking hard.

_No I’m not._

“I _need_ you,” she insists, resting her elbow over her helmet.  “I can’t run the suit mods on my own.  I can’t do everything I need to do on my own.  You volunteered to join up with me, remember?  That means I need you _here_ , with _me._   If trying to be there for everyone is going to end up with you killing yourself-” She winces at the sharp sting of hurt, “ _yes,_ _killing yourself_ , then you need to stop and learn to pick your battles.  Do you hear me?”

_You really don’t know how to ask nicely, do you?_

“You’re one to talk,” she snorts, closing the maintenance panel and pulling her helmet back on.  She dismisses the hardware warning on her HUD and heads back out for the war room.  “I’m not telling you to not be with your friends.  I’m just telling you that in order for you to be effective as a soldier, as a part of this team, you need to take care of yourself.”

When he says, _I’ve never done that before,_ she knows it’s true.

Doyle and Kimball are still in the war room when they arrive.  Hearing back from Washington and the boys had done a lot for everybody’s nerves, but Carolina can still read the tension in their shoulders when Epsilon winks into existence in front of her.  She’d half-expected him to hide.

_Nice to see your opinion of me is so pristine._

Maybe if she uses her most condescending voice, Carolina can provoke him into actually doing something about this.  “Church?  Do you have something you want to say to the generals?”

“Oh, yeah.  Uh, I’m sorry you were so wrong about the guys being dead.”

Even with their helmets on Carolina can tell just how unimpressed Kimball and Doyle are with the apology.  _Why_ does Epsilon have to be so incredibly abrasive in every aspect of life?  The worst is that according to the sim troopers he’s actually _more_ personable than Alpha had been, which is a terrifying thought. 

Church’s avatar flaps his arms as he imitates a sigh.  “ _All right_.  I.  Apologize.  For freaking the fuck out, or whatever.”

Kimball glances at Carolina before setting her gaze on Church’s avatar.  “We don’t have a lot of experience with AIs here, Epsilon.  That might be obvious.”

Carolina projects _shut up_ as hard as she can when she feels his urge to respond sarcastically.  _I wasn’t gonna do anything,_ Church hisses back as he says, “Yeah well, you’re not alone.  It’s not a big deal.”

“As such, I don’t know how to treat you sometimes.”  Kimball glances at Doyle.  “Neither of us do.”

“You wouldn’t be wrong there,” Doyle admits.

“So instead I’m going to just treat you as I would any other soldier.”  Kimball folds her arms.  “I understand you have some...difficulties with losing people.”

Church’s presence in Carolina’s mind goes prickly.  “Something like that.”

“I’m sorry we don’t have the medical avenues or expertise necessary to help with that.  If you think conventional psychology could assist then I’d recommend approaching Dr. Grey for counseling sessions-”

“No,” Church and Carolina answer quickly, sharing a glance and a mutual pulse of dislike in her head.  “No, uh,” Church continues, and the way he sits in her mind is almost like seeking comfort.  _I’m not good at this shit, all right?_   Story of Carolina’s life, being saddled with men who don’t know how to express themselves properly.  “I don’t think it’ll work anyway.  But thanks.  I’ll- take steps so it doesn’t happen again.”

“Good.”  Kimball glances between Church’s avatar and Carolina.  “And while I’m sure you already know this, I’m going to say it anyway: If you _ever_ put your own agenda before the wellbeing of Chorus again, you will detained and tried for treason.  Do I make myself perfectly clear?”

Church’s head jerks up.  “ _Tried?_ ”

“For treason, yes.”

Carolina tilts her head curiously.

“Uh- okay.  Yeah, I- I read you.  I understand, General.”  Church’s avatar fuzzes briefly before disappearing.  “I’m just- I’m gonna run background, clean some of this up.  Now.”

“Dismissed,” Kimball says dryly before returning her attention to Carolina.  “You look like you want to ask something.”

Carolina’s not sure when she and Kimball got to helmet-reading status, but she doesn’t think she entirely minds.  “I don’t think he was expecting that.”  When Kimball declines to answer Carolina shakes her head.  “He’s not listening, really.”

“I’m not entirely comfortable with letting him back into our systems,” Kimball admits.

“The assistance of an AI _does_ provide a large advantage over the enemy,” Doyle continues, “but it also requires an incredible amount of trust.  If he can’t be trusted to not use Armonia to his own advantage, then he’ll just need to stay with you, Agent Carolina.”

“That’s understandable.”  Carolina sighs, hands on her hips.  “I can’t promise you anything, anyway.  It might just be best to keep him with me for the foreseeable future.”

“I agree.”  Kimball braces her hands against the table.  “Though I also can’t say I don’t understand where he’s coming from.  Damn it.  I should’ve _known_ there was a reason those pirates were there before, I shouldn’t have sent just the two of them-”

“There’s no point in assigning blame for this now,” Carolina interrupts.  “They’ve checked in, they’re alive and they’ve got a mission to complete.  Our job now is to focus on the follow-up.  Assuming the mission’s failure, what do we need to do?”

When Kimball doesn’t straighten, Doyle clears his throat.  “Obviously, we’ll need to send another payload to complete the job.”

Carolina nods.  “Right.  Which I think is a sound decision anyway, even if the mission succeeds.  There’s no telling how far those things might’ve gotten after being disturbed; they might even have left the jungle.  We should send at least one more ship with heavy _and_ light armaments-”

“We don’t have the manpower for that,” Doyle argues.

“Then we should put a temporary stop to anything that’s not critical.  You’ve been saying it all along, General: this isn’t something we can ignore.”

Doyle looks up sharply.  “You- Yes, you’re right, of course.  I’ll…I’ll see about redistributing nonessential scout patrols.  That should give us enough men for a sweep of the surrounding area.”  He hesitates before glancing at Kimball.  “Miss Kimball?”

“Yes,” she mutters down to the table, straightening up and throwing back her shoulders.  “I’ll head over to munitions.  Sarge and Donut are surprisingly imaginative when it comes to assembling bombs, I’ll see if there’s anything they can put together for us.”

“I’m going to go patrol the perimeter.”  Carolina nods to Kimball.  “If the mercs know that Washington isn’t in Armonia, they might think it’s a good time to try and sneak someone into the city.”

“Good idea.”

“Then I suppose we all have our tasks to which we must attend.”  Doyle takes a moment to stare at Kimball, then turns and heads off without so much as a farewell.

Kimball, at least, looks as flabbergasted as Carolina does.  “Well what the hell was _that?_ ”

Carolina shrugs.

_He’s impressed by Kimball, probably._

Carolina doesn’t relay the message.  If Church had wanted her to hear, he’d have said it aloud.  She didn’t even know he was paying attention.

_I wasn’t until just now.  But he’s probably impressed she would go so far to save just a couple people.  I mean, he’s been running the army that she’s been throwing soldiers at like breathing’s going out of style.  He probably thought she’d just write them off as acceptable casualties._

“Carolina, are you good?”

“Yes.  Yeah.  I’m good.”  Carolina steps aside to let Kimball pass.  “Keep me posted, ma’am.”

Kimball shrugs a shoulder at the sign of deference.  “Sure.”

Church pops up as she departs, little avatar looking after her as well.  “I figured she would too.  Doyle, I get.  He’s just thinking of the whole.  And, well, himself.  He doesn’t know the guys like we do.”

“Doyle let Washington go when he thought he shouldn’t have,” Carolina points out.  “He was showing faith in his own way.”

“Whatever.”  Church glances back over at the holo-table.  “…guess I better watch myself.  Don’t wanna be _tried._ ”

“You sound almost happy.”

“Yeah, I guess I am.”  Church’s avatar glances up at Carolina, his presence seeping through her mind like warm water.  “It’s just nice.”

“Being reprimanded is nice.”

“Computers don’t get tried for treason, C.”  Epsilon disappears and Carolina takes that as her cue to leave.  **_People_** _do._

 

* * *

 

“Caboose, you got it?”

Tucker wedges his way between them and nudges Wash back.  “Wash, _stop hovering._   He’s got it.  The guy’s dead-lifted a Warthog, pretty sure he won’t keel over from a dinky little boomboom backpack.”

“I like that name,” Caboose supplies, idly tugging on Freckles’ trigger; the AI lets out a warbling party horn sound each time, but has long since run out of confetti.  “ _Boomboom backpack._   I like it.”

“Yeah, you would.” 

Wash tugs on the cabling they wrapped around the barrel and criss-crossed over Caboose’s chest, checking its strength.  “There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be concerned.  Just _dropping_ this could cause it to explode.”

“No it _won’t,_ stop fussing.”

“You’re making me sound like a clingy mother.”

“You’re _being_ a clingy mother.  Back off already, you’re giving me the jitters.”

“I’m pretty sure the hordes of undead aliens are what’s giving you the jitters.”

“Okay yes let’s talk about something else,” Caboose says loudly.

The elevator descends in silence, humming beneath their boots.

“I am going to hug Church when I get back,” Caboose chirps after a moment.  “Because he said we’re going to hang out and I am so, so excited.”

“I know you are, buddy,” Wash says in that soft voice again and Tucker tries to stick that in his head, tries to hold onto _Wash is here_ and _we’re almost done_ to chase away the anxiety that creeps into his bones as the elevator lights flicker past them on their way back down.

Seeing the sun descending toward the treeline had just really driven home that they’d only been on this mission for all of a day.  Not even a night-and-day kind of timeline, but literally just during the hours of daylight.  In just a handful of hours, they’d gotten _this_ fucked up.  He doesn’t want to think about what would happen if he’d actually come here alone, or if this infection made it back to Armonia. 

“-ucker.  Tucker, are you with us?”

Tucker snaps out of his daze to Wash’s hand on his shoulder, helmet tilted toward him in concern.  “I’m fine,” he mutters, though it’s not true.  “Just.  Want this over with.”

“I need you to stay with me,” Wash orders, giving him a gentle shake.  “We can’t assume that Locus and Felix have moved on.  We need to remain alert.”

“Isn’t there a little hiccup in that plan?” Tucker asks dryly, jerking his chin toward where Caboose is crouched and fiddling with one of his greaves, humming to himself.

“All the more reason I need you.”  Wash lets him go.  “Do I have you here?”

“Yeah, all right I get it.  No zoning out.”  Tucker shakes himself as much as his shoulder allows, tapping a hand against his thigh.  The elevator’s hum deepens as it slows, then settles gently into the depression in the ground.

“About how far is it to the armory you two found?”

“ _Forever,_ ” Caboose whispers.

“Not forever.”  Tucker hesitates.  “But kinda far, yeah.  D’you think we should feed the cable through the hole in the elevator?”

“No, there’s gaps in the side.  We’ll just have to be careful.”  Wash grabs onto Caboose’s arm to keep him from wandering away.  “It wouldn’t give it any more slack, anyway.  Tucker, keep an eye on the cable and our six.  I’ll take point.”

The hallways are easier to navigate; while they’re cramped and getting both Caboose and the barrel on his back squeezed in proves to be a challenge (and Washington almost has a heart attack when Caboose scrapes the barrel against the ceiling), the tight quarters mean nothing has a chance to sneak up on them, and Caboose can’t wander off without either of them noticing.  A few Flood combat forms wander their way and a few spores hound them, but opposition is noticeably lacking.  Their bootfalls echo in the larger rooms, muffle in the small passageways and agitate the hell out of everybody.  Tucker didn’t think it was possible but he’s _more_ alarmed that they’re not fighting for their lives right now.

Caboose ambles along as unaffected as ever, impossible to see around with everything he’s carrying and even less careful to be quiet than usual.  Tucker’s mind wanders against his will, imagining a Sangheili scientist a full head and shoulders taller than Caboose even hunched over trying to squeeze into the tunnels to investigate the structure.  What were they thinking when they’d found those flood forms?  Did they have any idea what they were even looking at, or did they only figure it out once the things were squirming around in their brains?  Tucker’s pretty sure he’ll be having nightmares for decades over what he’s seen here, but at least it didn’t _happen_ to him.  God, what if the Sangheili were still alive, and just couldn’t do anything except what the Flood wanted them to?

This quiet is giving him too much room to think and the painkillers are giving him too much imagination.  Washington radiating anxiety up in front isn’t helping either.

“This isn’t right,” Washington mutters, in full paranoia mode.  “These stragglers.  Don’t these things travel in- in swarms, or pods or whatever they’re called?”

“A bunch of crows is called a _murder,_ ” Caboose offers.  “I think we should call them that.  Because they murder people.”

Tucker tugs at the cable reel anchored beneath the barrel on Caboose’s back for some more slack.  “I second the motion and also humbly request the counsel chill the fuck out.  You saying crap like that is like inviting them to jump our bones, _literally_ jump _into_ our bones.”

“ _Quiet._   We’re switching over to radios.  I don’t want anything around listening in.”

Tucker sighs heavily before flipping over to the Blue Team frequency.  “Y’know, you’re not the one that’s been running from these assholes all day.  You could at least be a little less freaked out than us.”

_Ever heard of the calm before the storm?_

“Everybody’s heard of that, Wash.”

_I haven’t!  What’s it mean?_

“Everybody except Caboose.”

 _What it means,_ Wash continues grimly, poking his head and shoulder around a corner before slipping through the door and waving them forward, _is that this isn’t over yet, not by a longshot.  So keep your eyes and ears open._

Tucker rolls his eyes so hard it hurts, actually hurts.  He was grateful to Freelancer Wash making an appearance on the radio earlier today, a lifetime ago, but now with him here spouting his stupid dramatic lines and crawling the walls and getting all jumpy, he kind of wishes the guy would take a hike.  The warmth of their reunion has faded with water and food and enough painkillers to keep him functional, and rising up swiftly to take its place is a desire to just _be finished_ with this bullshit, get back to Armonia and go the fuck to sleep.

_Aren’t ears always open?_

And then there’s Caboose, who needs to be wrangled in every tenth step, distracted by the lights, distracted by the Flood and Sangheili ichor on the walls, distracted by his _own fucking shadow._   Freelancer Wash also doesn’t keep as close an eye on Caboose as he should because Freelancer Wash is obsessed with the potential of an attack.  Tucker is pulling almost triple duty here, making sure the cable doesn’t snag, keeping an eye out for enemies behind them and keeping Caboose from doing something stupid like trip over his own two feet.

There’s a sharp clatter behind them and Wash whirls around, rifle up and pointed at Caboose, who immediately kicks away the empty pistol he’d plucked from the grip of a dead infected merc before subsequently dropping it.  “Tucker did it,” Caboose announces aloud instead of over the radio.  Tucker can feel Wash’s patience fray, ever so slightly, as he lowers his weapon.

_Caboose, use the radio._

_Oh, right.  Tucker did it._

“Get back over here,” Tucker snaps, too eager to again, _be finished with this bullshit_ to be truly understanding.  Caboose shuffles over and Tucker shoves him into place behind a semi-glowering Wash before they start moving again, crossing the lightbridge and picking over pockmarked corpses further down into the underbelly of the ruins.

The weird pollen-dust that had hung around before is even thicker than when Tucker and Caboose made their way up, and Tucker can equate that only to something that is Not Good.  “Wash,” he says, waving his hand through the clouds and watching the particles swirl, “it wasn’t this bad before when we were coming up.”

“I am so glad I don’t get hayfever,” Caboose notes too loudly.

 _Caboose.  Radio_ , Wash reminds him sharply.  _We should assume we’ll be running into resistance down here, then.  Tucker, your priority is to watch that cable and guard Caboose._

“Uh, that’s definitely the harder job for me now!  My badass sword kicks these guys’ asses, let me be point and _you_ guard Caboose and watch the cable.”

_What?  No, absolutely not._

“Wash seriously!  I know where we’re going better than you and I need my hand for my sword so I can’t keep up with the cable!  Switch with me!”

Wash stares at him, visor impassive but his entire body language screaming how much he hates that Tucker is right.  _Fine,_ he bites out, squeezing past Caboose on one side as Tucker edges toward the other.

“Oh, hello!” Caboose chirps.

Tucker jerks around, thrusts his fist past Caboose’s side and activates his sword with a crackle that buries the blade right into the chest of a Sangheili Flood form.  “Company!” he calls to Wash as he shoves past Caboose as quickly as possible, cutting down another form that has begun to clamber over the first.  “Caboose get down!”

“Tucker this is no time for dancing!”

“ _Crouch down close to the floor you moron,_ ” Tucker snarls as he slams his boot into the chest of another form and winces when literally every bone in it cracks under the force.  The sharp burst of Washington’s rifle echoing through the hallway disorients the shit out of Tucker, but the Flood forms are hampered by the corpses of their fellows and drop like flies when Tucker flails inelegantly in their direction.  The wall is criss-crossed with singe marks from his sword by the time they’re finished and Tucker props himself up against the side of the wall, panting.

Caboose suddenly starts and sinks into a crouch, wobbling slightly off-balance from the barrel.  “Okay, I am down,” he announces.

 _We don’t have time to rest,_ Wash says, back to his team as he surveys the hallway behind them for more combatants.  _Tucker, lead the way._

_Jesus, let me catch my breath._

Wash half-turns and Tucker doesn’t like how he can’t read that particular angle of Wash’s helmet, can’t tell what his face looks like underneath.  _Catch it while we walk._

Caboose glances between them.  “Are we taking a snack break?”

 _Radio, Caboose,_ Wash says, and Tucker doesn’t like how his voice sounds so cold and matter-of-fact.  He doesn’t like it one bit.  And sure, they’re in the middle of trying desperately not to die, but if today has taught Tucker anything it’s that when you’re two minutes away from becoming a spatter on the wall, it’s good to have everything out on the open.

“Wash?  Chill out.”

Washington lowers his rifle just a touch, staring straight at Tucker.  “Excuse me?”

Tucker spreads his arm, gesturing around them.  “We all get it.  –well, _I_ get it.  This shit needs doing.  We’re gonna do it.  We might die in the process but you and me and maybe even Caboose if he can come back down planetside once in a while, we’re all gonna do our best to finish the mission and go back home at the end of it.  So stop being such a prick.”

Washington glances between them and again, Tucker really hates that he can’t read Wash’s expression right now.  It says a lot that Wash isn’t outright denying it; sometimes it shocks Tucker, how quickly people change from one moment to another.  Back at the crash site Wash slapped him with a hundred squats every time he mouthed off.  “I’m just trying to keep everyone focused.”

“No, you’re being a dick.”

Washington glances at Caboose, who wobbles his hand.  “ _Eeyyah,_ I mean, it’s really all subjective…”

“If these are gonna be our last moments, I don’t wanna spend them wishing I could punch you,” Tucker finally says, tired of bullshitting around.  God help him if he runs into Church while still this tired.  Who knows what he’d say?

“We won’t die,” Wash says firmly.

“Okay, agreed.  But discuss that with Caboose, because I’m in charge of the blowing shit up planning and he’s in charge of the staying alive planning.”  Tucker turns his back to start leading again because that at least sounded more like Wash and less like Agent Washington.  Caboose falls into step behind him immediately and Tucker feels better for it.

“We delegated,” Caboose adds over his shoulder.

“You guys are getting along better than usual,” Washington notes faintly, and even if the edges are still there, he’s at least _talking_ instead of _ordering._   Baby steps.

“Tucker was rude earlier and I gave him a lecture.”

“Caboose was also being an asshole.  …but yeah, he did.”

“We are good teammates,” Caboose says, and the pride in his voice puts a little bit of strength back into Tucker’s aching muscles and bones.

 

* * *

 

Passing through the Flood forms without alerting them was taking all of Locus’s impressive concentration and skill.  The things had no discernable eyes but jerked their heads to and fro, seemingly scenting the air around them before wandering off again, docile.  They moved sluggishly, without purpose until sensing something or someone, like a hypervigilant wasps’ nest.  He has to wonder if it has something to do with the pollen-like dust in the air, that perhaps it was used to track movement, but passing through the clouds of it does nothing more than annoy him.  Still, Locus spends more time still than moving, which severely hampers his progress toward where the sim troopers had gone.  That he’d had to take several detours to bypass doors that wouldn’t open didn’t help.

By the time Locus makes his way through the Flood swarms, the sim troopers and Washington have reunited and begun to make their way to the roof.  Felix isn’t pleased, but there’s nothing to be done about it.  His plan is sound enough so Locus agrees and begins his ascent through the complex.  The Flood forms he bypasses stick to the hallways, shuffling through rooms aimlessly but are making a noticeable creep upward to the surface.  Has all the activity disturbed them?  Maybe they were dormant deeper in the facility before today.

He still needs to make sure they continue their crawl upward.  He’s fairly certain that if he needs to he can escape the hordes; the tunnels are so small and narrow that simply piling it up with bodies will be enough to slow them down, but he doesn’t want to be overwhelmed in the middle of a firefight.  The chaos invites too many variables for him to feel like he’d have the upperhand, especially with Washington directing the two sim soldiers.  He doesn’t know much about the blue one besides what Felix has told him (whose opinion is incredibly biased and not entirely accurate), but the green one, Lavernius Tucker, has proven to be resourceful and tenacious even if his skill isn’t particularly threatening.  Locus will need to do this in _order._

First the Freelancer.  The sim troopers would be quicker, easier, but Washington poses the greatest threat.  Taking him out while Locus still has the element of surprise is the best course of action.  Then the troopers, in order of most competent to least competent.  If necessary he can get close quarters with the troopers, but Washington should be dealt with swiftly and without pause.

He hears their chatter long before he sees any of them.  Washington must be getting sloppy to allow such noise when he _knows_ that there could be combatants waiting to attack around every corner.  Locus slips into one of the side rooms and presses against the inner wall, keeping up his active camo for good measure.

“And so then _I_ said, I said to him, I said- Tucker?  You are being so stupid.  And Tucker said, he went, ah yes Caboose.  You’re right.  I’m the stupidest stupid who ever stupided-”

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?  That’s _not_ what happened.  You said some stuff, I said some stuff, and then you finally stopped dicking around and started actually _helping._ ”

“Now that is not nice!  I wasn’t just messing around.”

“I said _dicking_ around.”

“I do not like to use rude words because they are hurtful!”

“Oh really?  Because you call me stupid an awful lot for someone who doesn’t want to be hurtful.”

“You _do_ call him stupid a lot,” Agent Washington supplies, and Locus angles himself to watch them disappear down another tight cornered hallway.  He’ll need to follow them to a larger room in order to get a decent sight with his rifle; he has a sidearm, but nothing that’ll pierce the armor like it needs to in order to kill in one shot, not even with his skill.

Following them is simple, his own sounds masked by their own.  The blue sim trooper has a barrel strapped to his back, obvious explosives, and they trail a thick cable behind them that Locus can only assume leads to the detonator Felix saw on the roof.  He’d been right; they plan to destroy the entire facility from the underground up.

Still, one barrel of explosives isn’t possibly enough.  How do they plan to make up for the lack of destructive-

Oh.

Locus hugs the wall, skirting the edge as the team leads him into a room that has so much alien weaponry stacked inside that he’s fairly certain Felix would, to use his words, shit bricks.  The technology here is a veritable fortune, and is also incredibly, dangerously explosive.  It’s not a bad plan.

The blue soldier unshoulders the barrel and Locus times his jump from the walkway to an adjoining platform to its deposit on the ground.  His bootfalls are masked by the _thump_ and he edges alongside the platform until he finds a good angle, crouches, braces his rifle and waits for them to stop moving.  If he misses, if he hits that barrel then they’re _all_ of them dead.  Locus might disagree with Felix on many, many things but he’s with him on staying alive.

Washington keeps ducking behind the barrel, checking the cable connection.  He stands briefly to gesture at the sim troopers and issue orders to begin spreading out the alien ammunition and weapons among the hallways, but ducks down again.  Locus could change his angle for a better shot, but he’d have to jump to another platform.  It would make too much noise.  He’ll just have to be patient.

The blue soldier begins heaving up ammunition crates onto the walkway, disappearing with them down the halls.  He’s unreasonably strong; that’s something to look out for.  But he seems clumsy and perhaps addled as well, failing to follow even simple instructions without further clarification.  He’s not a threat.

Lavernius Tucker also appears to be wounded.  An arm is locked against his armor, his posture belying the hunched tension of a man in pain.  A good weakness to exploit.

The ammunition crates are almost gone, the blue soldier shuffling with the last one down the hallway when Washington finally clears the barrel.  Locus checks on the sim trooper standing still nearby and lines up the shot.  Washington’s grey and yellow helmet sits in his crosshairs; Locus visualizes himself as part of his rifle, as mechanical parts, arms, joints, wrists, knuckles down to the trigger, the hammer, the barrel, the bullet and holds his breath.

“Rain man!”

The gasped snarl startles him and suddenly Washington is gone from his crosshairs.  Locus curses and wrenches his sight away from his scope to find the green sim trooper pushing himself up from his tackle to drag Washington behind a nearby weapon stand.  _Shit._   How was he discovered?  The trooper hadn’t even been looking when he’d zeroed in on Washington, that wasn’t enough time to spot the subtle differences active camo creates, there’s no reasonable-

“Hey dipshit!  We fucking know you’re there!”  The voice of Lavernius Tucker is nasal, high-pitched and grating and Locus stifles a growl, edging toward the end of the platform and dropping to the ground.  He might’ve been compromised but he can still sneak up on them.  The light refracting from the alien weaponry might confuse them when looking for the shimmer of his camoufl-

A burst of rifle fire nearly takes his head off and Locus dives behind cover.  _How are they seeing him?_

“You seem confused,” Washington calls, and Locus wants to carve the insufferably smug tone clear out of his throat.  “Wondering how we can see you?”

He’s attempting to goad him, get Locus to answer so he can read his position.  Too used to fighting Felix.  Locus creeps from his cover to another weapon stand, back against it. 

 “I’ll give you a hint; you’re wearing it.”

Locus jerks his attention down to his armor.  No, there’s nothing, just his armor and-

No, there, along the lines of his armor, _that infernal dust_ from earlier.  It’s just faintly yellow but the particles are stuck to every piece of him, he must have picked it up from when he’d gone through the spore clouds down below- He’d been visible this _whole time,_ and the only thing that had kept him from detection was his own stealth!  Damn it, he’s _never_ been so negligent and cocksure-

“Caboose!” the green one shouts, “Locus told me that the reason why he’s so mean is because he wasn’t hugged enough as a kid!”

“Oh my god, that is so sad!”  Something like steel bands snap around Locus’s shoulders and lift him clear off the ground, crushing his lungs, pressure alarms lighting up all along the main plates of his armor as his camouflage deactivates.    _The blue soldier._   How the hell had he gotten behind Locus without- “You must be so lonely!”

Locus struggles, feet kicking back as he searches for purchase or leverage but the soldier has him hoisted high, held too tightly-  “Get- _off_ of me-”

The soldier knocks his head against Locus’s shoulder.  “I will help you heal.”

This is not how he’s going to meet his end, not with this ridiculous, _undignified_ \-  There, his sidearm, Locus snatches it from his thigh and discharges it toward the soldier’s boot; it pings off the armor, the angle wrong but the sim trooper startles anyway and drops him.  Locus gasps for air, sweeps out a foot and knocks the sim trooper to the ground.

He’s over him with the muzzle of his pistol pressed against the dazed trooper’s visor when Locus hears a roar and he’s plowed into from the side and to the ground.  At first he assumes a Flood form, aims but a gauntleted hand grabs his wrist and his shot goes wide, pings against the high ceiling.  Washington struggles against him, grappling for the firearm and Locus brings his legs between them, kicks hard and knocks him back.  Flips onto his feet, meets Washington’s second charge with a block, strike, elbow blow to the visor and the Freelancer stumbles back, disoriented as Locus aims-

The green sim trooper almost severs his arm from his elbow for his negligence.  Locus spins and throws a punch for his wounded shoulder but the other soldier is already swinging again, the hum of the plasma from his sword scorching the air in the wake of its arc and forcing Locus back, _again._   Locus takes stock, sees the blue sim trooper holding up a recovering Washington and he realizes with a sour taste in his mouth that without the element of surprise, he’s not going to be able to take them.  They’re too desperate, too determined.

In the distance, a Flood form screams.

The Lavernius Tucker and Agent Washington jerk toward the sound.  Locus activates his camouflage in the second they look away; the blue sim trooper sees him but fails to act, and by the time he informs his friends Locus will already be gone. 

Locus primes a grenade, drops it at the blue sim trooper’s feet and bolts for the door.

 

* * *

 

Washington hears the _ping_ of a grenade hitting the ground and everything around him slows to a crawl.  Caboose is right behind him, the grenade between them.  There are Flood forms swarming into the room from the hallway door.  Tucker is scrambling up from where he’d fallen after attacking Locus; his knee is weak and he drops again, he’s too exhausted, he won’t get away in time, Caboose hasn’t even moved because he hasn’t registered the danger-

Wash grabs the grenade with one hand and shoves Caboose back with the other, hurls it toward the Flood forms- it explodes too close and he slams back against Caboose- alarms shriek before going abruptly silent when something cracks sharp, needles driving into his skin, slicing open his cheek and forehead and for a heartstopping second Washington wonders if his eye is gone, like York, if only he had some lockdown paint, he’s waiting around outside Recovery for the doctor to say York can have visitors and his head is buzzing with doubt for the first time since signing up with the Project, he can’t figure out why the Director would tell them to use live ammunition on the new guy- girl- person, there must be some rule that he just doesn’t understand-

“ _Wash!_ ”

He’s moving, wrapped up in someone’s arms, he hasn’t been carried like this since he was five and his mother took him to bed after letting him stay up as late as he’d wanted on his birthday, before the fights started, before everything went sour, before he changed and all that mattered was the clock after midnight and her hand pushing back his hair, _Good night David, I love you,_

“Caboose, is he breathing?  _Shit,_ is he breathing?!”

_Mama loves you._

 

* * *

 

Felix drums his fingers against the flight controls of the Pelican as he approaches the temple’s coordinates, coaxes the aft thrusters into deceleration and swings down low just as Locus hauls himself from the center of the roof, fingers slipping on the slick of the decaying Flood forms.  Felix drops the rear bay doors, swings the bird around and once the heavy _clump_ of power armor hopping into the bay reverberates through the walls Felix primes the jets for max acceleration.  “Kill any of ‘em?”

_No.  We were interrupted._

Felix clicks his tongue.  Death by zombie chomp might be excruciating but Felix doesn’t like the idea of just _handing_ that honor over to the Flood.  “We could always just blast those barrels on our way out.”

 ** _No._** _We would never get clear in time._   Locus approaches the cockpit and hangs onto the doorjamb and every line of his posture screams frustration.  Well, good.  He let two morons and a washed-up Freelancer get the better of him.  _We need to report in to Control._

“Control, Control, _Control._   I’m tired of hearing about your girlfriend, Locus,” Felix complains, but he’s right.  They wouldn’t get clear of the blast in time, not with how huge it’ll end up being.  Felix guns the engines and lets the G forces press him back into the pilot seat. 

“We’ve lost several good men,” Locus growls off the radio, bracing himself against the corner of the door.  “We need to report in.”

“We lost several _average_ men,” Felix shoots back as they leave the temple behind them.  “ _We’re_ the good ones.”  Locus doesn’t have anything to say to that, which Felix will count as a victory for him.  “Moving on from your obvious codependency issues with our employer, they won’t be getting out of there.  I fucked with their countdown timer.  The object of your affections took the detonator with him so I couldn’t do much, but they won’t be getting off the ground anyway with what I did to their ship.”

Locus moves away from the cockpit.  “We’ll see.”

“Oh I’m sorry, which of us totaled their escape plan and then ran through the whole goddamn jungle to make it back in time to pick your ass up?  And _which_ of us failed to shoot the dumb ones like four times?”  Felix throws his arm over the seat to shout back into the passenger bay.  “So don’t get all bitchy because your prom date danced with me instead of you!”

 

* * *

 

Washington comes to with movement.

The rattling _updown_ of the pace becomes slower and smoother and everything darkens from royal to navy, and Washington blinks an eye up at the armor of the soldier hunched over him as they move through the tiny tunnels.  Something pops off his belt, there’s a _click_ and the _ping_ of a grenade landing and he lurches clumsily upward, grabs onto Caboose’s shoulders and almost slams them against the side of the tunnel trying to shove Caboose’s head down- “Grenade, _grenade,_ Caboose get down-”

They turn a corner and the explosion flecks debris against the wall behind them, the muffled _thump_ of it silencing the snarling screams Wash only just now registered.  They’re running.  His helmet’s gone, he can’t see out of one eye-

“Wash, Jesus Christ, you scared us,” Tucker says in front of them, out of breath and shaky with shock.  “We thought you were dead.  Don’t do that again!”

“Yes, not doing that again would be nice of you,” Caboose notes pleasantly. 

They wedge their way out of the tunnels and thunder toward the elevator and Wash clutches tightly onto Caboose’s armor until they’re almost halfway up.  “I’m- I’m okay, Caboose, put me down, I can run.”  He thinks.  Caboose sets him down and he sways but they’re both there, Tucker on one side of him and Caboose on the other, Tucker keeping an eye out for the Flood, sword crackling, Caboose with his arm up and hovering around Wash’s shoulders.

He reaches up to touch the blood pouring from a cut over his eye.  He can’t see shit, but his eye is still there and whole and his pounding heart begins to slow at the knowledge.  Thank fuck.

“Now you have almost died too,” Caboose tells him, and Tucker chokes on a laugh.

“The trinity is complete!  Fuck man, all we need is for Church to show up and delete himself.”

“No, I don’t think we need that.  That would be sad.  Also Church wouldn’t help very much right now because he doesn’t have a body.”

“Yeah, that’s true.  Church is pretty useless if he’s not riding bitch to a badass, huh?”

“But he can come be with me in my head and I will take good care of him anyway.”  Caboose sounds pleased with himself.  “I’m _very_ good at carrying things.”

“Bullet point number one on a short, short list.”  Tucker turns to Wash.  “You good?  You here with us?”

“I’m here,” Wash reassures him, pressing his hand over the stinging wound on his forehead.  “My helmet?”

“Gone, dude.  It was fucked anyway, barely anything to salvage.”

Damn.  “Are we safe?”

” _Fuck_ no.  We’re getting our asses chased by the Flood and there’s like four billion of them.”

Tucker was probably exaggerating, but not by much.  When Wash drops to a knee to look down through the hole in the center of the platform he can see Flood forms piling atop one another, scrabbling up the smooth walls after them.  The lead the elevator is giving them isn’t much.  In fact, if Wash isn’t mistaken, the Flood are _gaining_ on them.

He thrusts a hand out.  ” _My rifle._ ”  When nothing is pressed into his hand he stares up between them.  “…tell me it’s not back down there.”

“We were in a hurry!”

Okay, _okay._   “Caboose, lay down suppressing fire.  Tucker, see if you can get this thing to go faster.”

Tucker says, “I literally have no idea how to do that,” as Caboose says, “Well I don’t want to oppress anybody, especially with fire, I mean this is a free country and they can vote however they want-”

“ _Caboose._ ”  Washington rubs a hand down his face and it comes back smeared red.  Right.  Wounded.  “You and Freckles help those guys trying to catch up to us.”

“Okay!”  Caboose drops to a knee and shoves Freckles’s muzzle through the hole and Wash feels at least a little better with the flash of assault rifle fire cutting down their pursuers.  He glances at Tucker, shaking so hard Wash can see it.

Tucker catches him looking and straightens.  “I’m good, I’m good.  I’m just tired.  We’re almost out.”

“We’re almost out,” Wash agrees, cupping the back of his neck over his implants.  Without his helmet there’ll be no saving him from an infectious form.  His stomach turns at the idea of how _close_ he was to that, at the sight of the merc with the busted visor and writhing tentacles protruding from it.

Freckles buzzes happily when Caboose ejects a spent magazine and feeds another in.  At least one of them is having fun.

When the elevator levels with the ground floor Washington plucks his last grenade from his belt, bolts after Tucker and Caboose and tosses it behind them into the cloud of their pursuers.  They pile out the front door and Tucker deactivates his sword, locking the Flood inside.  It won’t take them long to find the hole in the roof.

Before Washington can even say a word Caboose is dropping to a knee and lacing his fingers, Tucker immediately stepping into his hand.  The boost Caboose gives him sends Tucker clear over the edge; Washington sees him stumble, catch himself and then disappear toward the center of the roof.

When Caboose stares expectantly Wash steps up and despite having just seen it, is still a little startled when he sails right up and over and has to land into a roll to keep from eating whatever mineral these ruins are made of.

“Wash, detonator!” Tucker calls, and when Wash tosses it to him he snatches it out of the air and makes for the console where the first Flood forms have already started squirming from the holes in the roof.  Tucker kicks them back down on his way over.

Washington turns and drops down at the edge of the roof, thrusting out a hand.  “Caboose!”

Caboose backs up a few steps to make his approach run, gets distracted by a flower until Wash desperately calls his name and then charges at the edge of the roof, kicks up and grabs onto Wash’s hand.  Wash nearly skids off the side at the weight but Caboose is already throwing an arm over the edge and hauling himself up.  “Did I hurt your shoulder?!” he gasps.

“What?  No.”  It does hurt but, “Get over to the Pelican, hurry!”  And Washington keeps his hand on Caboose’s back as they charge for it.  Washington unhooks the fuel cells from his armor and slides beneath the ship, only to find the maintenance panel ripped clear off and a mess of severed wires.  “ _Fuck,_ ” he snarls, reaches up for his ear for the radio before remembering his missing helmet and sliding back out to shout, “Tucker, hold them off!  The mercs sabotaged the Pelican, I have to try and rewire this!”

Tucker cuts down a Flood form but is bodychecked by another, hitting the ground with a grunt and only barely pushing himself up in time to avoid the follow-up strike.  “Hurry the fuck up, I’m getting my ass kicked over here!”

“I can do it!  I can do it, Agent Washington!”  Caboose peers under the Pelican’s nose.  “I did it before, I can do it!  I promise!”

Washington weighs the options.  He could have Caboose help Tucker but he’s only as vigilant as Freckles is.  Wash has never repaired a Pelican like this before and Caboose has that weird mechanical savant thing going on, except that Caboose isn’t in his ideal mindset for delicate work so- 

Wash sees Tucker drop to a knee behind them and squirms out from beneath the Pelican, thrusting the fuel cells into Caboose’s hands as he passes over Freckles.

Freckles corrects Washington’s aim only slightly as he takes out two forms that had been approaching Tucker’s position.  Tucker swings to the side, grabs a dying Flood form and stomps it into one of the holes on the roof, blocking it for a few precious seconds.  “Where the hell’s Caboose?!”

“Fixing the Pelican!”

“ _Are you kidding me?_ ”

“He repaired a Mantis-class assault droid with no training and limited tools, I think he can handle this!”  Wash puts his back to Tucker’s and suddenly everything is right, even with Flood forms spilling out from inside the complex through the holes in the roof, out the front door and crawling through the jungle, up the trees, onto the landing.  He keeps an eye out for strays that investigate the Pelican, cutting them down before they can even get close to the hint of the blue armor he can just barely see wedged beneath.  “He said he’s done it before!”

Tucker shifts to the side and they both swivel as he cuts down three forms at once.  “Bullshit, he’s _never_ done it before!”

“ _What?!_   But he said he had!”  Washington whirls around to blow out the knees of the two forms scrambling for the ship.

“Yeah Wash, he says a lot of shit!”

“I got it!” Caboose calls, crawling out from beneath the ship.  “I got it, I’m all done!”

Wash detaches himself from Tucker to clear the area.  “Tucker, get that detonator into the console!  Caboose get in the ship!”  He hears the _clank_ of the Pelican drop doors and empties Freckles’s last clip clearing the rooftop to give Tucker some breathing room before bolting for the Pelican.  He shoves Freckles into Caboose’s hands as he hauls himself inside.  “Caboose, feed Freckles!  Freckles, suppressing fire!”

The clack of Caboose reloading and the staccato of automatic weapons fire echoes through the passenger bay as Washington scrambles into the pilot seat.  The Pelican whines about bypasses and unnecessary power reroutes but the engines turn and cough to life, warming with that tri-toned hum that sense adrenaline through Wash’s bones every time the LZ’s hot.

He vaults from his seat long enough to cup a hand around his mouth and call, “Tucker, get that timer counting down, we’re good to go!”

 

* * *

 

No less than six different jokes race through Tucker’s head as he slots the detonator into place.  _I’m pretty damn good at putting it in, bow chicka bow wow!  Insert tab A into slot B and C me work the D.  Girl are those C4s?  ‘Cause that rack is the fucking **bomb** , _on and on, in a voice that doesn’t sound like his anymore, or maybe just not right now.  Right now his heart his pounding and his hand is shaking and he’s trying not to laugh at the situation, him thinking of pickup lines as he sets the countdown for ten minutes and syncs it up to his HUD, as Flood forms get as close as two feet from him before Freckles shreds them apart.

Done- _done-_

Tucker runs, thinks about his _wasted_ career in the NFL as he ducks and swerves around attackers and grabs onto the lift bar as the Pelican rises, kicks a form back and away and the Pelican is up, she’s airborne, _they’re fucking outta here_ they’re going home-

The countdown timer beeps down steady in the corner of his HUD where his compass display should’ve been, _9:35, 9:34, 2:00-_

…Wait-

_1:58-_

The countdown-

_The mercs sabotaged the Pelican-_

_1:52_

“And they sabotaged the bomb,” Tucker whispers to himself.  Beside him, Freckles blasts a leaping Flood form out of the sky.  Caboose is silent, steady and rooted, arms jerking with the assault rifle as he takes out the few that manage to jump high enough.  Wash, helmetless at the helm, primes the engines for a swift departure.

_1:46_

They won’t make it.  They won’t clear the blast zone in time.

_1:40_

_They’re not going to make it._

Tucker’s sword is in his hand, ignited and he’s jumping from the passenger bay before he even manages to give it a second thought.

If Caboose notices, Tucker doesn’t know.  If Wash notices, he doesn’t know.  The selfless part of him, the part he didn’t know he had until Junior came along hopes that they don’t notice, that they just fly off into the sunset and watch the bomb go off from a safe distance before they realize he’s gone.

_1:31_

Slamming into the Flood is like diving into a pool of sick.  He’s long since gotten used to the smell but it’s overpowering here as he cuts and cuts and cuts, _swish swish stab,_ necrotic flesh burns and crisps, towering rotting Sangheili fall over like tipped displays and two more take the place of every one that falls.  Tucker pulls in his shoulder and just twists, listens to his sword fizzle out in protest but he clears a path finally, finally.

_0:29_

The Blue Team frequency crackles with static in his ear.  _Tucker! **Tucker!**_

Caboose finally noticed.  As long as Wash doesn’t notice he won’t come back.  He doesn’t have his helmet on.  He won’t hear.  They’ll make it out in time.  Flood forms fall to a hail of rifle fire behind him and it gives Tucker enough time to scramble for the console.

_0:18_

_I always did hope it would be cool,_ Tucker thinks, barely aware of his surroundings as he plucks open the command panel.  The countdown resets.  Counts down too quickly again so he resets, _resets,_ slams his fist against it until the numbers scramble and settle on _2:00_ and count down normally, second by second, little segments of his life that he has left until he’s dead.  _Death by bigass sacrificial explosion is pretty cool I guess._

_1:57_

_This is the second time I’ve saved the planet_ , Tucker realizes, some stupid dinky little mudball that nobody really knows or cares about.  _I wonder if they’ll put up a statue._ A statue would be cool.  _Ah, shit; I hope someone remembers to tell Junior._   That hurts the most.  He would’ve liked to see his kid at least one more time. 

_1:51_

He reaches into the pocket of his chestplate for the photograph and stares down at it.  The Flood forms start pouring from inside the building anew.  They swivel around, take stock of their surroundings.  The first few run for the edge of the building and leap but Tucker doesn’t see them, doesn’t see the ones who spot him and roar, scream, howl, tear in his direction, motivated by some primal need to break and rip and tear.

_1:49_

When the highlight reel of his life doesn’t flash before his eyes, Tucker figures it’s probably because he didn’t have _nearly_ enough sex.  That’s what the army does to you.  Makes you practically celibate.  Makes the life that flashes before your eyes boring.  He should’ve tried harder to bone people in Armonia.  He should’ve had a bisexual awakening.  Widened the selection pool.  What a waste, sticking just to jelly when there’s peanut butter to be had.  The army is full of peanut butter and severely lacking in jelly, and he could’ve been getting laid all this time.  Maybe in the next life he’ll be more into dudes.  That’d be nice.

_1:35_

At least Wash and Caboose will make it.  People who say they’ll think of the bigger things when they sacrifice themselves are fucking liars, because nobody can look at the big picture when you’re standing so close to it.  Tucker sees pancakes in the morning, Wash performing this ridiculously complicated and admittedly badass stretch and balance routine in the gutted half of a crashed spaceship, Caboose scrubbing Tucker’s armor clean in blinding canyon sunlight, complaining but making sure he got all of it, making sure he made it _perfect_.  He sees Jensen and Palomo doing their stupid puppy love dance, he sees Grif smoking and Simmons bitching and Donut Donuting and Sarge asking to borrow the tank without quite _asking_ so much as demanding in exchange for a temporary cease fire in a war they’re not even fighting.

_1:20_

Last time, sacrifice had sort of just happened unplanned.  Felix slid the knife in and Tucker had to think then, _well, guess I’m dying for this bullshit._   He hadn’t expected it to go that way.  It was more like an unfortunate side-effect to getting one up on the fucker.  It turned out okay in the end and he lived and got another badass scar for people to admire, but it still hadn’t been something he’d done consciously- or rather, he knew he was in danger but he figured he’d make it out fine as usual.  When he’d collapsed he hadn’t had time to think about what this meant, why people would do this willingly.  Now, with the clock counting down in hours instead of seconds (those eternal blips of time when your brain knows this is it for you and is overclocking itself to give you just a few more precious moments of life), _now_ he thinks he might get why someone would.

_1:04_

It’s not anything noble or great or peaceful.  Tucker’s gonna enjoy watching these things burn with him, he’s gonna enjoy knowing that he’s wrecking the motherfucking _shit_ of the things that murdered the Sangheili, who he’s sorta come to like after everything.  He’s gonna enjoy knowing that Palomo might eventually work up the nerve to kiss Jensen, he’s gonna enjoy knowing that Donut is going to scar the rest of the Reds with a bedazzled speedo or something tomorrow.  Caboose is going to break an expensive piece of equipment and blame it one someone else, and Wash is going to down fourteen cups of coffee, run himself ragged sixty hours straight and then pass out halfway on his bunk.  Grif is going to keep smoking, keep raiding the kitchens.  Simmons is going to keep bitching, keep self-sabotaging his bid for power with his own meltdowns.  Sarge is going to keep barking orders at anybody who’ll listen, and everybody who won’t.  Church is going to stick with Carolina and they’re going to go be their own cool kids club and they’re going to take care of each other and Doc…well honestly, who cares about Doc?

_0:50_

Tucker looks up to face the Flood forms converging on his position. 

He has a few regrets, sure.  He regrets not calling Junior more, even if it’s expensive and a pain in the ass.  He should’ve spent more time with his kid, should’ve gone out of his way to spend more time.  He should’ve _demanded_ an embassy pass, should’ve _demanded_ leave to go see him more often.  He should’ve tried harder to make that work.  He should’ve just up and fucking left, stole a fucking ship and flown over to his kid even if he’d go to military prison for deserting.  Sure, he knows what they have together is good, even great, but there isn’t enough time in the world to spend with your kids.  Even when your kid is a parasite alien baby who put you in a coma.  Because it doesn’t matter where you came from or what people call you when you know, when you just fucking _know_ what you are. 

He’s a dad.  He’s a soldier.

And he’s never going to see any of his friends or family ever again.

_0:40_

…shit.

“This fucking blows,” Tucker sighs and he tilts his head back and closes his eyes.

The rooftop heaves and Tucker stumbles, falls, hits the ground hard with his shoulder instead and stars burst in front of his eyes.  He gasps in agony and clutches it, _0:35_ , was that a fucking _earthquake-_ Tucker pushes himself up on his good elbow, the Flood are turning from him, scrambling toward something else- And then he sees regulation blue heaving forms left and right, throwing them like rag dolls, ripping them to spongy pieces before barreling right for him and he’s _furious-_

“Caboose!” Tucker shouts, “ _What the fuck are you doing?_!”  They won’t make it, _they won’t make it now-_

Caboose throws an arm around Tucker and drags him up like a sack of flour.  “We are _planning teammates,_ ” he snaps, hauling Tucker against his side.  Tucker slaps at the reset - _2:00-_ as Caboose drops his head and shoulder to hurtle back through the Flood. 

All Tucker sees is a blur of sickly yellow and brown and puke green as Caboose fights his way through and he tries, he tries to help but he feels sick and sluggish, he almost takes off Caboose’s leg with his sword and just puts the goddamn thing away, the numbers are ticking down too fast now in the corner of his display and then his stomach lurches as Caboose jumps, the jungle below their feet, individual leaves, vines, trees trembling under the force of the Flood forms climbing them, reaching-

 _Clan_ g, they hit the deck of the passenger bay and Tucker loses time, _0:46_ to _0:32_ and Wash is shouting for them to hang on.  The Pelican accelerates suddenly, _too fast they’re not supposed to be this fast_ and Caboose had been pulling them up but they hit the deck again, slammed down and skidding toward the open bay door until Caboose grabs something, jerks them to a stop, arm tight enough around Tucker’s waist that he can feel his ribs creaking as they go careening across the sky, bay door flapping wildly until it snaps off and cuts its way through the air to the jungle below.

_0:20_

“Why the fuck did you come _back,_ ” Tucker mourns, clutching at Caboose’s armor.  They could’ve lived.  _He fucking jumped so they’d live._

_0:10_

The wind is screaming through the passenger bay so Tucker almost misses it when Caboose murmurs, “Better dead than Red.”

_0:00_

The explosion is small, for only a second, a bubble of bright white in the distance until suddenly it’s more, the ground swelling and bursting beneath the ruins and the white goes blue, purple, green, white again, Tucker’s HUD dims to compensate but it just grows and grows until it’s huge and racing toward them and swallowing the jungle as it collapses.  Tucker silences his external mic, reaches up to silence Caboose’s helmet, hopes Wash has got the partition closed because the sound that hits them is so loud Tucker feels it like a ship crash, invisible and powerful and everything and all he can hear is the scream of the warnings on his HUD about radiation, heat, crushing pressure on his chest plates.

The ship rattles in the shockwave and drops terrifyingly for a few seconds before stabilizing, lifting back up with that swooping-gut feeling and the blast stops gaining, recedes, shrinks.  Tucker lays there, clutching Caboose’s arm almost as hard as Caboose is clutching him, staring at the fading plasma bubble as it turns instead into an all-consuming fire that eats away at the trees and burns everything, glassing the entire jungle in a slow creep of liquid flame.  Their flight slows from its breakneck pace, slows until gravity and g-forces aren’t trying to tear them from the belly of the ship but Tucker still can’t move.  His brain is slow, his limbs weak.

The partition between the bay and cockpit slides open.  “ _Caboose-!_ ”

“It’s okay!” Caboose calls over his shoulder.  Tucker’s heart is still pounding but it’s finally slowing down, finally, and when he pulls up the biofeed of his teammates he can see Caboose’s heart hammering too, spikes too close together, too many mountains and not enough flatland.  “We are both watching the fireworks now Agent Washington, please pay attention to the road.” 

Tucker hears Wash curse, a sharp _motherfucker_ that sounds weird with that shake, that tremor that’s almost never in Wash’s voice, not like that.  When Caboose’s arm finally unwinds from his waist Tucker pushes himself up to sit and scrabbles for the seals of his helmet; the air is blisteringly hot as it rushes against his face but it’s moving and it tears through his hair and it feels better than he ever thought anything could feel. 

Nobody will have to say goodbye to Junior for him. 

They'll get back to the city and Grif will rag on him for crashing the Pelican.  Dr. Grey will insist on giving him a psychological shakedown when she hears that he threw himself back onto the roof.  Wash might give him a day to recover before he gets him back on his training schedule, Church will laugh at him because he'd _said_ not to fuck it up and Tucker had done his level best to fuck it up anyway. 

Everyone will do what they always do and he'll be there to do what _he_ always does, too.

Caboose is trying to pull himself up into a seat so Tucker turns and helps, finds strength somewhere to hook a hand in the side of his chestplate and pull up.  “Alright, alright,” he says as Caboose slumps back into the seat.  Tucker pulls the harness over him and locks it into place, then stumbles his way toward the cockpit.  “I’m alive,” he announces, bracing himself against the doorframe.

“Despite trying your damnedest to die,” Wash says tightly, punching in a few commands before leaning back with a sigh.  “Autopilot’s fried.  Whatever Caboose did to fix the ship boosted the speed but wrecked damn near everything else.”  He mutters as he taps at the controls.  “Still don’t know how the hell he-”

“Why didn’t you go?”

Wash looks up at him.  Tucker wonders if because they spend so much time behind visors and armor that when it’s off they’re so easy to read.  He can see everything in the hard, haunted look in Wash’s tired eyes, the stubborn set of his jaw, the lines across his brow that Wash is thinking, _my men are stupid and I hate them sometimes._ “I couldn’t.  I can’t.”

Everything inside of him trembles with relief and Tucker blames it on the adrenaline crash.  “Well.  You’re stupid.”

“Caboose jumped before I even noticed you were gone.  If you have anyone to blame, it’s him.”

“Believe me, I’m blaming him too.”

Wash jerks a thumb over his shoulder.  “Go sit.  I’ve got to call in our approach.  We'll discuss your worrying new habit of self-sacrifice some other time.”

“Oh fuck you, like you have room to talk.”

When Tucker turns around Caboose is by the open bay door, hanging onto the lip of the seal.  Tucker heads over and reaches up with a wince to do the same, stretching out sore back muscles.  His eyes are drawn to the glow of the jungle melting, fire licking at the edges of a smoldering sore, burning so hot that he can still feel the heat of it on his face.  Or maybe he can’t, maybe he’s too far and it’s psychosomatic.  It doesn’t matter.

He glances over at Caboose.  There’s blood dry and drying from his hairline to his jaw, a wound Tucker hadn’t realized Caboose even had reopened; sometimes when he looks like that, when he’s quiet, Tucker could almost be fooled into thinking of Caboose as an actual soldier.

Caboose gives him a smug look. “You’re welcome for saving your life, stupid.”

Tucker stares.

“And I didn’t even have to kiss you,” Caboose continues haughtily, puffing out his chest.  “I can’t wait to tell Church.  He’s going to be so impressed.  He is going to give me a Best Friend badge and we are going to go hang out, and you can’t come because you are not invited.”

“Hey fuck you,” Tucker protests.  “I don’t need to be invited to your stupid playdate.  I’ll hang out with Church on my own.”

“No, he’ll be busy hanging out with me.”

“Says who?  You don’t know his schedule.  You’ll have to ask Carolina anyway because she has dibs.”

“She will let Church hang out with me and not you because she likes me better.”

“She does not!”

“She does too.”

“Does not!”

“Does too.”

“Does not.”

Turbulence jostles them together but Tucker doesn’t move away once they’re steady again.  Together, side-by-side, he and Caboose watch the forest, the ruins, the Flood all burn to cinders, then ash, then nothing at all.

“…does too.”

“Not.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shit it's done  
> THANKS TO EVERYBODY WHO READ ALONG WITH ME!!! i'm so happy i finished this, i've actually never finished a longfic before in my life. FYEAH ACCOMPLISHMENTS!


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